CHRISTIANITY  IN 
ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NKW  YORK    •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO  •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA  •    SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


CHRISTIANITY  IN 
ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 


BY 

GEORGE  BURMAN  FOSTER 

Late  Professor  of  the  Philosophy  of  Religion  in  the  University 

of  Chicago;  Author  of  "The  Finality  of  the  Christian 

Religion,"  and  "The  Function  of  Religion 

in  Man's  Struggle  for  Existence" 


EDITED  BY 

DOUGLAS  CLYDE  MACINTOSH 

D wight  Professor  of  Theology  in 
Yale  University 


gork 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1921 

All  right*  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1921, 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published,  February,  1921 


EDITOR'S  PREFACE 

George  Bunnan  Foster  was  born  on  the  second  of  April, 
1857,  and  died  on  the  twenty-second  of  December,  1918.  Prior 
to  his  occupancy  of  the  chair  of  the  Philosophy  of  Religion  in 
the  University  of  Chicago  he  was  Professor  of  Systematic  The- 
ology in  the  Divinity  School  of  the  same  institution.  The  pres- 
ent volume  embodies  his  lectures  'on  the  dogmatics  and  ethics 
of  the  Christian  religion  in  the  form  in  which  these  were 
last  delivered  to  his  theological  classes.  The  main  body  of  the 
book  is  made  up  of  the  dictated  portion  of  the  lectures.  The 
foot-notes  contain  a  report,  also  practically  verbatim,  of  elabora- 
tions and  extemporaneous  remarks  introduced  by  the  lecturer 
at  the  indicated  points  of  the  main  discussion.  Former 
students  will  recognize  here  especially  many  of  the  brilliant 
and  memorable  sayings  of  this  inspiring  and  thought-provoking 
teacher. 

Professor  Foster  was  a  remarkably  sympathetic  interpreter 
of  points  of  view  other  than  his  own.  But  in  his  exposition  of 
the  appreciations  and  viewpoint  of  the  Christian  religious  man, 
one  knew  that  it  was  not  a  case  of  understanding  through  mere 
sympathetic  imagination ;  he  was  speaking  out  of  the  depths  of 
his  own  experience.  He  knew  what  religion  was,  for  it  was 
his  daily  life. 

It  was  this  in  no  small  part  that  made  him  the  fearless  critic 
of  unintelligent  dogmatism  in  the  name  of  religion.  With  him 
radical  criticism  was  instrumental ;  the  conservation  of  genuine 
religious  values  was  the  end.  He  was  interested  in  the  remov- 
ing of  those  things  which  were  shaken,  that  the  things  which 
were  not  shaken  might  be  seen  to  remain.  He  could  take  more 
daring  excursions  into  the  realms  of  doubt  than  would  have 
been  spiritually  safe  for  a  less  deeply  religious  man.  He  could 
venture  to  question  even  fundamentals,  and  the  vitality  of  his 
religious  life  and  spiritual  appreciations  would  carry  him 


2019767 


vi  EDITOR'S  PREFACE 

through  to  the  home  of  abiding  values.  And  he  was  great 
enough  frankly  to  retrace  his  steps  when  he  found  any  good 
reason  for  doing  so. 

Humane  and  sympathetic  toward  every  fellow-sufferer,  his 
sensitive  soul  was  called  upon  to  pass  through  many  experiences 
which  were  peculiarly  tragic.  But  in  a  very  real  sense  it  may 
be  said  that  his  suffering,  even  here,  was  vicarious.  For  he 
was  able,  as  few  are,  to  lead  the  afflicted  and  perplexed  to  the 
sources  of  spiritual  strength.  As  he  himself  said,  it  is  not  those 
who  suffer  most  who  are  in  the  greatest  danger  of  losing  their 
faith  in  view  of  the  disasters  and  calamities  to  which  human 
life  is  subject;  their  need  of  God  is  too  imperious  for  them  to 
be  able  to  give  him  up.  And,  with  all  allowance  for  such 
modifications  of  opinion  as  are  to  be  expected  from  time  to  time 
in  the  mind  of  so  eager  and  incessant  a  thinker,  I  believe  it 
may  be  said  that  this  book  as  it  stands  represents  in  the  main 
those  moral  and  religious  convictions  to  which  in  the  various 
vicissitudes  of  life  this  sincere  lover  of  truth  was  ever  wont  to 
return  after  all  investigation  and  reflection. 

As  editor  of  this  work,  I  must  assume  responsibility  not  only 
for  the  title,  but  for  the  fact  of  publication  itself.  I  am  not 
sure  that  Professor  Foster  ever  contemplated  giving  these  lec- 
tures to  the  public.  However,  I  am  glad  to  have  the  approval 
of  Mrs.  Foster  in  the  present  undertaking.  Obviously  the  book 
lacks  the  finished  form  which  it  would  have  received  had  it  been 
put  forth  by  the  author  himself,  but  I  must  leave  it  to  the 
interested  reader  to  judge  whether  the  decision  to  publish  has 
been  well-  or  ill-advised.  The  book  must  speak  for  itself. 

D.  C.  MACINTOSH. 
New  Haven,  November  11,  1920. 


CONTENTS 


FIEST  TREATISE:    THE  DOGMATICS  OF  THE 

CHRISTIAN  RELIGION 

INTRODUCTORY.  PAGE 
§1.  The  problem  of  the  scientific  treatment  of  dog- 
matics         1 

§2.  Division  of  our  subject 5 

PAKT  I.     THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     .      .       7 

A.  THE  ESSENCE  OF  CHRISTIANITY  AS  RELIGION 7 

a.  The  Historical  Phenomenon  of  Christianity 7 

§3.  Faith  in  Christ  as  the  center  of  Christianity     .       7 
§4.  The   Christian   faith  in   God,  in  connection  with 

the  idea  of  redemption 9 

b.  The  Peculiarity  of  the  Religious  Life,  as  against  Other  Sides 

of  the  Life  of  the  Spirit 10 

§5.  The  way  to  a  knowledge  of  the  essence  of  religion     10 
§6.  The  salient  distinguishing  marks  of  the  religious 

life        . .11 

§7.  Human  need  and   surrender  to  divine  revelation 

the  basis  of  the  religious  life 13 

§8.  The  importance  of  feeling  in  religion,  and  the 
character  of  the  religious  judgment  as  value- 
judgment  15 

§9.  The  relation  of  religion  to  the  other  spiritual  ac- 
tivities of  man,  i.  e.,  to  the  aesthetic,  the  sci- 

.  .   entific  and  the  moral 17 

§10.  Examination  of  deviating  conceptions  of  religion, 

and  comprehensive  definition 22 

§11.  The  question  as  to  the  origin  of  religion    ...     24 

c.  The  Peculiarity  of  Christianity  as  against  Other  Religions   .     28 

§12.  The  gradation  of  religion  (stages  of  religious  de- 
velopment)    28 

§13.  Comparative  characteristics  of  Christianity    .      .  29 

§14.  The  essential  and  permanent  in  Christianity  .      .  31 

B.  THE  TRUTH  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION 33 

a.  The  Effort  to  Provide  a  Theoretical  Proof  of  the  Truth  of  the 

Christian  Faith 33 

§15.  The  stimulus  to  attempts  at  theoretical  proof     .  33 
§16.  The  insufficiency  of  the  traditional  theistic  argu- 
ments      34 

§17.  The  comprehensive  reason  for  the  collapse  of  all 

the  attempts  at  theoretical  proof     ....  35 

b.  Practical  Substantiation  of  the  Truth  of  the  Christian  Faith  .  38 

§18.  The  two  main  points  of  practical  proof,  and  the 
modern  views  of  the  world  which  confront 
Christianity 38 

§19.  The  immediately  experienced  worth  of  Christian 

faith  for  the  individual  and  the  community     .     39 

§20.  Philosophic  amplification  of  the  question  of  worth     42 
vii 


iii  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

c.  The  Revelation-Basis  of  our  Christian  Faith 43 

§21.  The   need   of    supplementing    the   value- judgment 

argument 43 

§22.  The  revelation  of  God  in  the  person  and  spiritual 

work  of  Jesus  Christ 44 

§23.  Justification  and  amplification  of  the  proof  from 

given  revelation 46 

§24.  Connection  between  the  revelation-proof  and  the 

worth-proof 48 

d.  Inferences  from  the  Christian   Revelation-Concept    ....      49 

§25.  The  fundamental  character  of  the  Christian  reve- 
lation-concept    .49 

§26.  The  content  of  the  Christian  revelation-concept  in 
relation  to  the  New  Testament  proclamation  of 
Jesus  Christ 51 

§27.  The  question  of  the  extension  of  the  revelation- 
concept  to  Old  Testament  history  and  to  extra- 
Christian  humanity 53 

C.  THE   KNOWLEDGE    WHICH    ACCRUES    TO    CHRISTIAN    FAITH,    AND 

CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS 55 

a.  The  Character  of  the  Knowledge  which  Accrues  to  the  Chris- 

tian Religious  Faith,  and  of  the  Theologico- 
Scientific  Knowledge  of  that  which  is  Believed  55 

§28.  Christian  religious  knowledge  as  faith's  under- 
standing of  revelation  .  55 

§29.  Scientific  dogmatics  in  its  distinction  from  the 

knowledge  which  accrues  to  Christian  faith  .  56 

§30.  The  relation  of  the  knowledge  which  acrues  to 
faith,  and  the  relation  of  dogmatics  also,  to  the 
theoretical  knowledge  of  the  world  ....  57 

b.  The  Sources  of  the  Knowledge  that  Accrues  to  Christian  Faith, 

and   Dogmatics 60 

o.     The  Sacred  Scriptures     ...  60 

§31.  Exposition   and  appreciation  of  the  ecclesiastical 

doctrine  of  inspiration 60 

§32.  Historical    judgment    concerning    the    importance 

and  the  origin  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament 

collection   of  writings 62 

§33.  The   judgment   of   Christian   faith   concerning  the 

importance  and  origin  of  Sacred  Scriptures   .      63 
§34.  The  principles  guiding  the  employment  of  Sacred 

Scripture   in   Christian  dogmatics       ....      65 

ft.    The  Doctrine  of  the  Church 67 

§35.  The   importance  of  the  development  of  Christian 

doctrine  in  general  for  our  faith-knowledge  and 

and  for  dogmatics     .  ...      67 

§36.  The  importance  of  the  reformation  understanding 

of  salvation  for  the  knowledge  which  accrues  to 

faith  and  for  dogmatics 68 

§37.  The    importance    of    evangelical    confessions    for 

faith -knowledge  and  for  dogmatics    ....      70 

c.  The  Method  of  Christian   Dogmatics 71 

§38.  The  method  of  the  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dog- 
matics .  .  71 

§39.  The  various  methods  of  modern  dogmatics     .      .  73 

§40.  Comprehensive  and  constructive  statement  of  the 

dogmatic  method 76 

§41.  Definition  and  demarcation  of  our  further  task    .  78 


CONTENTS  ix 

PAGE 

PART  II.     THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS  80 

§42.  Introductory 80 

A.  GOD  AND  THE  WORLD 81 

a.  The  Nature  of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus  Christ 81 

a.  Fundamental  Definition  of  the  Nature  of  God     ....  81 

aa.  The  View  of  Scripture  and  of  Church  Doctrine  as  to  God  81 

§43.  The  Old  Testament  and  the  New  Testament  knowl- 
edge of  God 81 

§44.  The  doctrine  of  God  in  the  orthodox  ecclesiastical 

dogmatics         83 

bb.  The  Systematic  or  Constructive  Development     ...  84 

§45.  The  absolute  end  of  God  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ, 

or  the  Kingdom  of  God 84 

§46.  The  spiritual  work  of  God  revealed  in  Jesus 
Christ,  in  order  to  the  realization  of  his  King- 
dom    89 

§47.  The  world-governing  work  of  God  revealed  in 
Jesus  Christ  in  order  to  the  actualization  of 

his  Kingdom         91 

§48.  Comprehensive  definition   of   the   essence   of   God. 

(God  as  "Love,"  as  "Heavenly  Father")    .      .  92 

cc.  Critical    Limitation 94 

§49.  The  apparent  contradiction  between  the   concept 

"  personality  "  and  the  absoluteness  of  God     .  94 

§50.  The  revealed  and  the  hidden  sides  of  God's  being  96 

/3.  The  Trinitarian  Unfolding  of  the  God-idea 98 

§51.  Exposition  and  evaluation  of  the  Christian  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity 98 

§52.  The  Christian  faith  in  God's  Word  and  Spirit     .  100 

b.  God  and  the  Finite  World  in  General 102 

a.  God's  Relation  to  the  World  as  His  Creature  and  Instru- 
ment       102 

§53.  The  Christian  view  of  God  and  the  Christian  view 

of  the  world.      (Division  of  the  subject)    .      .  102 

aa.  Creation  and  Preservation 103 

§54.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  and  the  Biblical  view 

of  creation  and  preservation 103 

§55.  Systematic   development   of   the   Christian   tenets 

concerning  creation  and  preservation      .      .      .  104 

§56.  Relation  between  the  Christian  creation-faith  and 

the  present  scientific  picture  of  the  world     .      .  106 

bb.  The  Divine  Government  of  the  World  and  Providence   .  108 

§57.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  and  Biblical  views  of 

God's  providential  rule 108 

§58.  The  ground  and  content  of  the  Christian  provi- 
dence-faith    109 

§59.  Providence  and  miracle.     Providence  and  freedom  111 

§60.  The  doctrine  of  angels 113 

/3.  God's    Attributes    in    Connection    with    the   World    as   His 

Creature  and  Instrument 114 

§61.  Concept  and  division  of  the  attributes  of  God     .  114 

§62.  Eternity  and  omnipresence,  omnipotence  and  om- 
niscience of  God 116 

§63.  The  goodness  of  God 117 

§64.  The  wisdom  of  God 118 

c.  God  and  the  Ethical  World 119 

a.  The  Divine  Destiny  of  Man 119 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

§65.  The  doctrine  of  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  concern- 
ing the  original  state    (status   integritatis)      .  119 
§66.  The  Christian  propositions  concerning  the  divine 

destiny  and  endowment  of  man 120 

/3.  Human    Sin 122 

aa.  The  Essence  of  Sin  and  the  State  of  Sin  of  the  Indi- 
vidual  and   of   Humanity 122 

§67.  The  doctrine  of  sin  in  ecclesiastical  dogmatics    .  122 

§68.  The  criterion,  concept  and  fact  of  human  sin  .      .  124 
§69.  The  grounds  of  the  power  of  sin  in  us  and  around 

us 125 

§70.  The  guilt  of  sin  and  the  stages  of  sin  .      .      .      .  127 

bb.  Sin  and  Evil 128 

§71.  The  evil  embedded  in  sin  itself 128 

§72.  Sin  and   outer   evil 129 

§73.  The  doctrine  of  Satan 131 

•y.  God's  Relation  to  Sinful  Humanity 133 

aa.  God's  Dominion,  Rule,  in  Relation  to  Human  Sin   .      .  133 

§74.  God's  decree,  or  purpose,  in  relation  to  human  sin  133 
§75.  God's   judicial   and   pedagogic   guidance   and  the 

goal  of  his  ethical  world-order 134 

bb.  God's  Attributes  in  Relation  to  Human  Sin   .      .      .      .135 

§76.  In. general 135 

§77.  The  attributes  of  God  as  judging  sin     ....  135 

§78.  The  attributes  of  God  as  redeeming  sinners   .      .  136 
§79.  The  combination  of  the  two  series  of  attributes  as 

regards  human  sin 137 

B.  GOD  AND  JESUS  CHRIST  THE  LORD 138 

a.  The  Problem  of   Dogmatic   Christology  and  the  Way  to  Its 

Solution 138 

a.  The  Problem  Especially  in  Relation  to  the  Biblical  Material  138 

§80.  What  the  Biblical  material  is,  and  its  worth  for 

our  task 138 

§81.  The  problem  in  relation  to  the  Biblical  witness  of 

faith  in  Jesus  Christ 141 

/3.  The  Direction  of  the  Principal  Christological  Attempts    .    143 

§82.  The  ecclesiastical  two-nature  doctrine,  and  its  per- 
sistence into  the  present     .      .  .    143 

§83.  The  rationalistic  Christology  and  its  persistence 

into  the  present ...    147 

§84.  Schleiermacht-r's  Christology,  and  its  further  de- 
velopment  in  the  present 151 

7.  The  Way  to  the  Solution  of  the  Problem 153 

§85.  Historical,  ethical  and  religious  evaluation  of  the 

person  and  work  of  Jesus  .      .  ...    153 

§86.  Fundamental  ethical  and  religious  judgment  con- 
cerning  Jesus       .  .    158 

b.  The   Systematic   Development   of   Propositions   of   Faith   Con- 

cerning Jesus  Christ.     The  Man  Jesus  as  Medi- 
ator between  God  and  Man 161 

o.  The  Earthly  Life  of  Jesus  as  the  Being  of  God  in  Jesus  and 

the  Being  of  Jesus  in   God      .  .    161 

§87.     Examination  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the 

three-fold  office  of  Christ    ...  .      .    161 

§88.  God's  being  in  Jesus:  Jesus  the  bearer  of  divine 

life         .  163 

§89.  God's  being  in  Jesus:  Jesus  the  bringer  of  divine 

life  in  us 165 


CONTENTS  xi 

PAGE 

§90.  Jesus'  being  in  God:  Jesus  the  perfect  man,  well- 
pleasing  to  God 167 

§91.  Jesus'  being  in  God:  Jesus  our  representative  be- 
fore God .  .  168 

§92.  Synthesis.     God   in  Jesus  and  Jesus  in  God,  or 

Jesus  the  mediator  of  the  new  covenant     .      .171 
/3.  The  Suffering  and  Death  of  Jesus  as  Consummation  of  His 

Earthly    Life 172 

§93.  The  problem,  and  attempts  of  the  church  to  solve 

it.     Critique  of  these  attempts 172 

§94.  Jesus'  suffering  and  death  as  culmination  of  a 
human  life  well-pleasing  to  God  and  vicarious 
for  us 177 

§95.  Jesus'  suffering  and  death  as  consummation  of  the 

divine  work  of  grace 179 

§96.  Comprehensive     expression     of     the     redemptive 

worth  of  the  suffering  and  death  of  Christ     .   180 

SECOND  TKEATISE:    THE  ETHICS  OF  THE 
CHRISTIAN  RELIGION 

§97.  Introduction:  The  task  of  Christian  ethics  in  re- 
lation to  the  task  of  Christian  dogmatics  .  .  190 

§98.  The  relation  of  Christian  ethics  to  philosophical 
ethics,  and  the  task  of  grounding  or  establish- 
ing Christian  ethics 192 

PART  I.     THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS  ....    194 

A.  THE  PECULIARITY  OF  THE  MORAL  LIFE 194 

§99.  The  conception  of  the  moral  law 194 

§100.  The  essence  of  the  moral  judgment,  in  relation  to 

other  value- judgments 197 

§101.  The  idea  of  freedom  and  accountability     .      .      .198 
§102.  The   process  of  conscience  as  psychical  forms  of 
the  manifestation  of  the  ideas  of  moral  law  and 
freedom 199 

B.  THE  TRUTH  OF  THE  MAIN  MORAL  IDEAS 201 

§103.  The  controversies   over   and   the  new   interpreta- 
tions of  the  moral  law 201 

§104.  The  truth  of  the  idea  of  the  moral  law  ...  203 
§105.  The  truth  of  the  idea  of  freedom.  Determinism 

and  Indeterminism 205 

C.  THE  HISTORICAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  MORAL  CONCEPTS  AND  THE 

UNIVERSAL  VALIDITY  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  MORAL 

VIEWS  211 

§106.  The  factors  of  progressive  moral  development  .  211 
§107.  Proof  of  the  universal  validity  of  the  Christian 

ideal  of  morality 212 

§108.  Morality  and  religion:  Christian  revelation  and 

the  question  of  a  religionless  morality   .      .      .215 

PART  II.     THE   SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     .   220 

§109.  Sources  and  method 220 

A.  THE  REVELATION  OF  GOD  IN  JESUS  CHRIST  AS  THE  BASIS  OF  THE 

NEW  CHRISTIAN  LIFE    .  .221 


ii  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

a.  The  New  Ethical  Goal  of  Life,  Revealed  in  Jesus  Christ    .      .221 

§110.  The  kingdom  of  God  revealed  in  Jesus  as  the  chief 

good  and  as  the  ethical  norm 221 

§111.  The  divine  law  preached  by  Jesus  in  its  distinc- 
tion from  other  laws  of  life 224 

§112.  The  law  of  God  in  its  main  content  as  preached 

by  Jesus 226 

§113.  The  revelation  of  the  Christian  ideal  of  life  in  the 
person  of  Jesus  Christ  himself,  or  Jesus  as 
example 228 

b.  The  New  Ethical  Power  of  Life,  Given  in  Jesus  Christ     .      .  229 

§114.  The  need  of  a  renewing  ethical  power  of  life  .  .  229 
§115.  The  renewing  ethical  power  of  life  given  to  us  in 

the  idea  of  the  Holy  Spirit 230 

§116.  The  operative  motive  for  the  ethico-religious  life 

proceeding  from  Jesus  Christ  .  ....  231 

§117.  Methodic  conclusions  for  the  further  treatment 

and  division  of  Christian  ethics 234 

B.  THE  CHRISTIAN  FORMATION  OF  THE  HUMAN  PERSONAL  LIFE,  OR 

INDIVIDUAL  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS 235 

a.  The  Christian  Personality  as  Gradually  Becoming   ....   235 

§118.  The  idea  of  conversion  in  relation  to  the  temporal 

development  of   the   Christian   life     ....   235 

§119.  The  character  of  true  repentance 237 

§120.  The  problem  of  Christian  perfection      ....    23S 

b.  The  Growth  or  Becoming  of  Personality  in  the  Doing  of  Duty 

and  the  Fulfilment  of  Vocation 239 

§121.  The  idea  of  duty  and  the  validity  of  this  idea  for 

the  Christian*  life 239 

§122.  Vocation  241 

§123.  Self-dependence  of  moral  personality  on  the  basis 

of  vocation ;  the  question  of  collision  of  duties  .  242 
§124.  The  question  of  a  super-dutiful  and  a  sub-dutiful 

act         244 

c.  The  Becoming  of  Christian  Personality  as  Formation  of  Virtue 

and   Character 248 

a.  The  Concept  and  Main  Features  of  Christian  Character      .   248 

§125.  Virtue  and  virtues;   character  and  characters     .   248 

§126.  The  main  features  of  the  religious  character  of 

the  Christian 250 

§127.  The  main  features  of  the  moral  character  of  the 

Christian 253 

ft.  The  Formation  of  Christian  Character,  Especially  in  View 

of  Sin 255 

§128.  Education   and   self -education  255 

§129.  The  question  of  asceticism  and  the  struggle  with 

temptation  .      .   257 

§130.  Christian  character  and  recurring  guilt    .      .      .  259 
y.  The   Fundamental   Frame  of  Mind  of  the  Christian    (The 
Basic  Temper  or  Disposition  of  Christian  Char- 
acter)           260 

§131.  Relation    between    the    dignity    of    the    Christian 

character  and  honor  in  human  society   .  •    .      .   260 

§132.  The  Christian  life  and  hereafter:  the  question  of 

eternal    life 261 

8.  The  Single  Virtues .261 

§133.  The  task  of  this  section,  and  the  matter  of  divi- 
sion   263 


CONTENTS  xiii 

PAGE 

§134.  The  principles  of  duty  and  the  virtues  of  religio- 

ethical  moralization  of  the  self  and  of  the  world  264 
§135.  Love  to  God  from  the  standpoint  of  duty  and 

virtue 266 

§136.  Love  to  neighbor  from  the  standpoint  of  duty  and 

virtue 267 

C.  THE  CHBISTIAN  FORMATION  OF  THE  LIFE  OF  HUMAN  FELLOWSHIP, 

OB  SOCIAL  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS 268 

a.  Christianity  and  Culture  in  General 268 

§137.  The  concept  and  the  diverse  ramifications  of  civi- 
lization, or  culture 268 

§138.  The  fundamental  relation  of  Christianity  to  civi- 
lization, or  culture 269 

b.  The  Individual  Orders,  or  Communions  of  Secular  Culture     .  271 
a.  The    Family 271 

§139.  Christian   marriage 271 

§140.  Conclusions  from  the  Christian  valuation  of  mar- 
riage, as  to  the  relations  of  the  sexes     .      .      .   273 
§141.  The  Christian  household       ..      .     ,      .      .      .      .274 

j8.  The  Economic  Life 275 

§142.  The  idea  and  problem  of  economic  life  ....   275 
§143.  The  attitude  of  Christianity  to  capital  and  labor, 

or  the  life  of  work  and  of  gain 276 

§144.  The  ethical  requirements  that  Christianity  makes 

of  the  economic  order 277 

GLOSSARY 281 

INDEX  .  .  283 


CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN 
EXPRESSION 

FIRST  TREATISE 

THE  DOGMATICS  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION 
INTRODUCTORY 

§1.  The  Problem  of  the  Scientific  Treatment  of  the  Dogmatics 
of  the  Christian  Religion. 

1.  The  dogmatics  of  the  Christian  religion  1  seeks  to  give 
a  scientific  exposition  of  the  Christian  faith.  It  is  a  doctrine 
of  faith,  of  the  content  of  faith,  and  therefore  of  the  world  of 
faith,  i.  e.  a  world  which  faith  affirms  to  be  reality.2  But  it  is 
precisely  on  this  account  that  the  fundamental  difficulty  of 
dogmatics  arises,  viz.,  How  can  the  invisible  spiritual  reality 
affirmed  by  faith  become  an  object  of  scientific  investigation  and 
exposition  ? 

Notes  to  §1:1 

1.  Christian  dogmatics,  Christian  ethics  and  Christian  apologetics 
are  commonly  included  under  systematic  theology.  Other  religions 
have  their  own  dogmatics,  ethics  and  apologetics. 

Christian  dogmatics  is  not  identical  with  biblical  theology.  Biblical 
theology,  as  such,  yields  no  universally  valid  truth.  It  is  simply  a 
branch  of  historical  theology,  of  history.  It  tells  what  was,  and  is 
not  at  all  concerned  with  what  ought  to  be,  and  so  biblical  theology  as 
such  does  not  constitute  the  message  of  the  preacher  any  more  than 
isolated  biblical  ideas  as  such  constitute  the  message  of  the  preacher. 
Biblical  religion,  with  its  dogmatics  and  ethics,  was  historically  and 
temporarily  conditioned  in  a  social  and  intellectual  situation  in 
which  we  do  not  participate. 

Dogmatics,  however,  undertakes  to  set  forth  what  is  universally 
valid  and  preachable.  The  preacher's  message  is  formulated  in  the 
dogmatics  and  ethics  of  the  Christian  religion. 

Dogmatics  is  not  philosophy  of  religion,  although  the  study  of  dog- 
1 


2        CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

matics  raises  many  philosophical  problems.  Philosophy  of  religion 
has  dogmatics  as  a  part,  and  the  most  important  part,  of  its  subject- 
matter. 

Hegel  said  that  dogmatics  set  forth  Christian  truth  in  the  form  of 
Vorsiellung,  i.  e.  in  a  presentative,  symbolic,  pictorial  form ;  but  that 
philosophy  of  religion  set  it  forth  in  the  form  of  Begriff,  i.e.  of 
concept.  Philosophy  of  religion  would  undertake  to  make  the  tran- 
sition from  the  symbolic,  which  is  proper  in  religion,  to  universal 
concepts.  Hegel's  general  position  in  its  original  form  has  been  over- 
come; but  like  John  Brown,  while  its  body  lies  mouldering  in  the 
grave,  its  soul  goes  marching  on,  and  this  particular  distinction  of 
Vorstellung  and  Begriff  gives  the  general  distinction  between  dog- 
matics and  philosophy  of  religion.  Dogmatics  is  not  so  abstract,  nor 
does  it  seek  so  ultimate  a  universal.  It  seeks  truth  more  nearly  in 
the  form  of  symbol.  Thus  it  sets  forth  better  what  is  preachable. 

Biblical  theology  is  concerned  with  facts.  Philosophy  is  concerned 
with  truth.  Christian  dogmatics  is  concerned  with  the  religious  truth 
belonging  to  the  Christian  religion.  But  dogmatics  is  concerned  with 
the  statement  of  Christian  truth  in  such  a  form  as  can  be  domesti- 
cated in  the  experience  of  the  modern  man.  There  will  be  doubtful 
points,  but  they  will  be  seen  to  be  due  to  the  connection  of  dogmatics 
with  biblical  and  historical  data  regarding  which  scientific  investiga- 
tion is  itself  in  doubt  to-day.  I  am  willing  to  say  that  when  dog- 
matics comes  to  fruition,  its  statements  will  not  be  jeopardized  by 
the  fact  or  non-fact  of  historical  elements.  While  we  are  not 
concerned  in  dogmatics  to  set  forth  what  empirical  sciences  hold,  we 
do  aim  to  set  forth  the  Christian  religion  so  as  not  to  clash  with  scien- 
tific presuppositions  and  procedure  and  results. 

The  reading  most  strongly  recommended  in  connection  with  the 
course  is  Kaftan's  Dogmatik.  I  am  inclined  to  doubt  its  philosophical 
basis,  but  in  the  way  he  goes  at  the  problem  and  in  the  Christian  con- 
tent and  solidity  of  his  thinking,  Kaftan's  work  is  unsurpassed  to-day 
in  dogmatics.  [This  was  in  1905.] 

2.  Theology  or  dogmatics,  as  doctrine  of  religion  (Kant's  Religions- 
lehre),  or  doctrine  of  faith  (Schleiermacher's  Glaubenslehre) ,  is  in- 
cluded in  the  science  of  faith,  or  science  of  religion  (Religionswissen- 
schafi)  as  part  of  its  subject-matter. 

Whether  or  not  Christian  faith  is  right  in  its  doctrines  of  God, 
the  world,  man  and  salvation,  is  not  quite  the  business  of  dogmatics. 
That  is  the  work  of  apologetics.  Whether  it  is  reality  or  illusion  is 
not  the  question,  though  faith  affirms  the  reality,  and  I  do  not  see 
how  faith  could  survive  if  the  ideas  were  to  be  regarded  as  illusion. 
Christian  dogmatics  has  not  to  defend  the  truth  of  the  view  of  God 
and  of  man  which  is  implicit  in  the  Christian  faith,  but  to  set  forth 
the  content  of  that  faith,  the  intellectual  element  which  is  integrally 
there. 

Dogmatics  is  analogous  to  a  statement  of  the  tenets  of  the  Repub- 


CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS  3 

lican  party  from  the  standpoint  of  the  Kepublican  party.  The  state- 
ment is  made  for  a  practical,  not  a  philosophical  end. 

Is  philosophy  everybody's  affair?  Some  are  pragmatic,  rather  than 
speculative,  and  their  religion  must  come  that  way.  Others  are  meta- 
physical to  the  nth  power.  They  have  to  wear  out  their  teeth  on  the 
file  of  ultimate  questions;  whether  they  get  anything  thereby  or  not, 
they  have  to  gnaw  at  it. 

The  dogmatic  and  practical  has  its  place.  There  is  something  which 
ought  to  be  done.  If  we  are  going  to  do  it,  we  must  do  it  together; 
and  if  we  are  to  do  it  together,  we  must  have  a  common  platform,  and 
it  must  not  be  too  academic. 

Philosophy  has  the  right  to  criticize  any  dogmatic  platform,  to 
examine  it  from  the  standpoint  of  reason.  It  acts  as  a  purifier,  cor- 
rective, and  ennobler.  The  last  word  is  said  by  the  philosopher. 
As  people  rise  in  intelligence,  they  are  more  and  more  influenced 
and  led  by  the  philosopher.  But  philosophy  is  more  likely  to  be 
found  outside  the  church  and  politics  than  inside.  The  ecclesias- 
tical and  the  political  crowd  shrink  and  shrivel  in  the  presence  of 
philosophers.  The  practically-minded  wince  under  philosophical 
criticism,  and  would  be  more  comfortable  without  the  philosophers. 
The  program  of  the  philosopher  is  not  immediately  practicable  with 
the  crowd,  but  ultimately  it  is  the  only  practicable  thing.  Every 
philosopher  dies  some  sort  of  death,  but  progress  is  the  progressive 
appropriation  of  philosophical  ideals.  The  crowd  passes  through 
three  successive  stages  with  reference  to  the  ideals  of  the  philosopher : 
conflict,  compromise,  capitulation.  For  leadership,  one  cannot  be 
too  far  ahead  of  the  crowd! 

2.  This  difficulty  would  be  avoided  by  assigning  to  dogmatics 
the  task  of  delivering  an  exposition  of  dogmas  subject  to  au- 
thoritative revision,  i.  e.  of  doctrines  officially  valid  in  a  given 
church.1  Moreover,  some  theologians  have  assigned  dogmatics 
to  historical  theology.  In  that  case  the  difficulty  would  be 
avoided.  But  historical  theology  is  concerned  with  facts,  not 
with  truth ;  with  what  was,  not  with  what  ought  to  be.  And 
indeed  this  limitation  of  the  dogmatic  task  to  historical  theol- 
ogy has  not  been  adhered  to,  even  by  these  evangelical  theo- 
logians themselves,  least  of  all  by  Schleiennacher,  who  is  the 
great  champion  of  the  conception.  Moreover,  this  limitation 
is  impracticable  in  connection  with  the  evangelical  appreciation 
of  dogma,  for  the  evangelical  church  subjects  its  beliefs,  or 
dogmas,  to  a  progressively  better  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures. 
That  is,  dogma  has  no  static  and  absolute  value  to  the  evan- 
gelical theologians. 


4       CHEISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Note  to  §1 :  2 

1.  Dogmas  are  deliverances  concerning  faith,  sustained  by  ecclesi- 
astical authority. 

If  dogmatics  were  exposition  of  dogmas  authoritatively  taught,  the 
dogmatician  would  not  be  responsible  for  getting  at  the  inner  spiritual 
reality;  the  authority  would  be  responsible  for  that.  The  historical 
theologian  is  not  concerned  with  the  search  for  the  universally  valid. 

A  dogma  is  like  a  political  platform.  It  is  conventional.  The  un- 
conventional, the  heretical,  is  bohemianism. 

3.  A  different  stating  of  the  task  of  dogmatics  grows  out  of  a 
consideration  of  the  nature  of  the  Christian  faith  alongside  of 
the  historical  problem.  Christian  dogmatics,  it  will  be  seen,  in- 
quires not  only  as  to  the  officially  valid  ecclesiastical  doctrine, 
but  as  to  the  universally  valid  Christian  truth.1 

Note  to  §1 :  3 

1.  When  do  dogmatic  declarations  pass  as  proved  ?  Do  they  pass  as 
proved  when  they  are  seen  to  be  necessary  constituents  of  the  religious 
conviction  as  a  whole  that  is  valid  in  the  evangelical  church  and  pecul- 
iar to  it?  Have  they  validity  apart  from  the  presuppositions  of 
faith?  For  example,  that  the  world  was  created  is  a  conviction  of 
Christian  religious  faith.  Is  it  a  necessary  constituent  to  that  faith, 
inalienable  from  the  Christian  faith?  If  so,  does  it  pass  as  proved 
on  that  account?  Also,  is  that  declaration  valid  apart  from  faith? 
Should  we  have  the  proposition,  if  we  had  no  religious  faith?  Is  it 
a  concept  which  is  an  instrument  in  any  of  the  sciences  to-day?  If 
not,  and  if  dogmatic  propositions  are  valid  for  faith,  but  not  for 
science,  it  is  not  to  be  expected  of  science  that  it  will  furnish  these 
propositions,  or  even  corroborate  them.  They  must  only  be  such 
that  science  need  not  demolish  them.  Does  science  need  to  negate 
faith's  proposition  that  the  world  was  made  by  God?  I  do  not  have 
to  make  my  faith  valid  from  the  point  of  view  of  science,  do  I? 
But  suppose  I  say  the  world  was  made  in  six  days.  Science  denies 
this.  The  added  proposition  is  not  a  proposition  of  faith,  but  a  datum 
for  scientific  consideration.  It  is  a  case  of  conflict  between  scien- 
tific theory  and  scientific  theory,  not  between  science  and  faith.  To 
say  "  in  six  days  "  is  to  corrupt  and  weaken  faith  and  expose  it  to 
attack,  and  to  fall  a  victim  to  science  which  will  either  refute  me,  or 
else  bring  the  subject  under  agnosticism. 

4.  Accordingly  "  theological  encyclopedia "  must  assign  to 
Christian  dogmatics  its  place,  not  under  the  historical,  but 
under  the  "  normative  "  disciplines.1 

Note  to  §1 : 4 

1.  An  historical  discipline  would  be  concerned  with  officially  valid 


CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS  5 

Christian  doctrine.  A  normative  discipline  is  concerned  with  uni- 
versally valid  Christian  truth.  The  relation  between  explicative  and 
normative  sciences  harks  back  to  the  great  metaphysical  discussion 
regarding  the  relation  between  cause  and  worth,  which  is  the  ultimate 
problem. 

See  Wundt's  Ethics,  on  normative  and  explicative  sciences.  Cf. 
James :  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience,  Ch.  I. 

5.  If  now  according  to  this  the  task  of  a  systematic,  scien- 
tific determination  of  the  content  of  the  Christian  faith  still 
exists,  the  question  arises,  What  is  it  that  science  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  is  competent  to  perform  as  regards  our  subject-mat- 
ter, viz.  the  "world  of  faith"  to  which  we  referred  at  the 
outset  ? 

§2.  Division  of  our  Subject. 

1.  In  order  to  solve  the  question  of  §1 :  5,  we  must  consider 
first  of  all  the  character  of  Christianity  as  religion,  and  the 
proof  of  its  claim  to  give  universally  valid  truth  of  revelation. 
It  is  only  when  this  is  done  that  the  essence  of  the  knowledge 
which  accrues  to  Christian  faith  and  the  share  of  science  in 
the  exposition  of  the  content  of  the  Christian  faith  can  be 
determined.     All  this  forms  the  foundation  of  Christian  dog- 
matics, which  must  precede  the  superstructure.     By  foundation 
is  meant  simply  the  doctrine  of  principles. 

2.  Accordingly  the  foundation  involves  a  more  comprehensive 
task  than  the  old  "  prolegomena  to  dogmatics."     Indeed  the 
task  is  three-fold :     (A)   to  establish  the  essence  of  Christianity 
as  religion ;   (B)  to  determine  the  truth  of  the  Christian  re- 
ligion; and,  on  the  basis  of  these  two,  (C)  to  expound  (a)  the 
knowledge  which  accrues  to  the  Christian  religious  faith,  (b) 
the  theological-scientific  doctrines  of  faith  (i.  e.  dogmatics)  in 
their  inner  connection  and  in  their  difference,1  and  (c)  what 
the  connection  is,  and  what  the  difference,  between  thoughts 
that    accrue    to    faith    and    thoughts    concerning    that    faith. 
Under  A  and  B  the  cardinal  points  of  the  philosophy  of  religion 
and  apologetics  must  be  discussed,  but  as  auxiliary  and  instru- 
mental.    But   the  unitary   center  of  the   whole  fundamental 
part  is  the  fixation  of  the  concept  of  Christian  revelation ;  the 
unitary  goal  is  the  gaining  of  firm  ground  and  a  clear  norm 


6       CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPEESSION 

or  rule  for  a  science  of  Christian  faith,  i.  e.  of  the  doctrine  which 
accrues  to  Christian  faith. 

Note  to  §2 : 2 

1.  The  theologian's  fallacy  (corresponding  to  James's  "psychol- 
ogist's fallacy")  is  the  confounding  of  the  theologian's  own  ideas 
about  ideas  which  accrue  to  faith  with  those  ideas  themselves. 

3.  It  is  on  account  of  this  special  end,  but  also  from  general 
principles  (cf.  §5),  that  we  set  out  in  Part  A  not  with  the 
universal  idea  of  religion,  but  with  (a)  the  concrete  historical 
phenomenon  of  Christianity,  in  order  to  determine  more  compre- 
hensively and  more  accurately  the  essence  of  Christianity  (b)  by 
means  of  a  psychological  analysis  of  the  religious  life  and  (c) 
by  means  of  a  religio-historical  comparison. 


PART  I.     THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN 

DOGMATICS 

A.    THE  ESSENCE  OF  CHRISTIANITY  AS  RELIGION 

a.  THE   HISTORICAL  PHENOMENON   OF   CHRISTIANITY 
§3.  Faith  in  Christ  as  the  Center  of  Christianity. 

1.  As  an  historical  phenomenon  Christianity,  as  its  name 
indicates,  is  to  be  referred  to  a  unitary  starting  point  and  to 
an  original  basic  character.1 

Note  to  §3 : 1 

1.  Was   there   no    Christianity    before    Christ?     Historically,    No. 
Philosophically  and  religiously,  Yes.     Wherever  there  is  a  Christian 
relationship,  there  is  Christianity. 

2.  Faith  in  Jesus  as  Christ  (Xpiards),  and  therein  as  Lord 
(Ku/aios)  was  constitutive  for  the  formation  of  a  self-dependent 
Christian  religious  community.     It  is  precisely  this  faith  which 
constitutes  (a)  the  connection  of  Christianity  with  the  religion 
of  the  Jewish  people,  but  also  (b)  its  severance  from  it,  and  (c) 
its  distinction  from  all  other  religions. 

3.  This  Christ-faith  is  by  no  means  a  mere  addition  or  accre- 
tion  which   contradicts    the    original    proclamation   of   Jesus. 
Rather  is  it  an  answer  or  response  to  Jesus'  own  claim  to  pos- 
sess Messianic  dignity.1 

Note  to  §3 :  3 

1.  Since  the  above  notes  were  prepared,  I  have  come  to  be  more 
doubtful  as  to  whether  Jesus  really  did  lay  claim  to  Messianic  dignity. 
According  to  Weinel  it  is  our  scientific  duty  to  confess  that  the  data 
are  wanting  for  a  sure  judgment  with  reference  to  the  matter  one 
>way  or  the  other.  H.  J.  Holtzmann  said  recently  that  from  the  point 
of  view  of  Christian  faith  it  makes  no  difference  whether  Jesus 
made  that  claim  or  not. 

Was  there  any  such  being  as  the  Messiah,  as  a  matter  of  fact? 
Primarily  the  Messiah  is  an  idea,  a  concept.  But  if  there  was  no 
such  reality,  what  value  is  there  in  the  concept?  What  function  did 
the  concept  serve  ?  What  would  become  of  Jesus  and  his  effectiveness 
without  that  category  ?  By  which  sign  did  he  conquer  —  as  Jesus  or 

7 


8       CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

as  Messiah?  Outside  of  Palestine  the  term  "  Messiah"  was  dropped, 
and  that  of  "  Logos  "  was  taken  up ;  later  other  interpretations  were 
substituted.  Which  is  the  more  effective,  that  which  the  collective 
life  contributes  to  the  ideal  construction,  or  the  actual  Jesus  of 
history?  The  datum  donated  or  the  construction  by  which  he  is 
categorized  ? 

Is  the  specifically  religious  feature  the  datum  Jesus,  or  the  con- 
struction which  has  been  made  from  age  to  age?  Is  not  religion  a 
collective  expression  of  life?  Must  not  the  religion  of  the  people  be 
made  by  and  for  the  people?  Is  Jesus  the  founder  of  the  Christian 
religion?  Sects  are  founded,  but  is  religion  founded?  Is  Jesus  in- 
cidental or  essential  to  the  Christian  religion?  Is  there  anything  in 
the  past,  which  is  in  the  past  alone  and  not  also  in  the  present,  which 
is  essential  to  Christianity? 

The  preponderating  weight  of  evidence  is  to  the  effect  that  Jesus 
did  claim  to  be  the  Messiah.  On  any  other  hypothesis  it  would  be 
hard  to  account  for  the  death  of  Jesus. 

At  all  events,  Jesus  understood  Messianism  in  a  new  way.  By 
word  and  deed  he  attributed  to  his  person  a  fundamental  significance 
for  the  accomplishment  of  the  divine  will  in  history  as  a  whole,  and 
in  the  individual  man. 

4.  This  Christ-faith,  reaching  back  to  Jesus  and  the  first 
Christian  community,  has  experienced  manifold  constructions 
and  transformations  during  the  further  history  of  Christianity, 
and  to-day  it  is  customary  to  consider  it  as  constitutive  for  the 
Christian  religion,  since  every  ignoring  or  setting  aside  or  per- 
version of  the  Christ-faith  has  involved  or  drawn  in  its  train  a 
confluence  or  fusion  of  Christianity  with  religious  or  philo- 
sophical tendencies  of  a  different  character.1 

Note  to  §3:4 

1.  The  abandonment  of  the  specific  Christ-faith,  or  its  equivalents, 
ends  in  the  amalgamation  of  Christian  with  non-Christian  ideas. 
Does  this  involve  dropping  down  to  natural  religion  and  a  depoten- 
tiation  of  our  best  religious  values?  Is  our  coming  type  of  religion 
specifically  Christian? 

Perhaps  the  highest  category  we  can  apply  to  Jesus  is  not  Messiah, 
but  man.  Do  we  know  anything  higher  than  the  human?  Are  we 
modern  men  saying  the  highest  we  know  how  to  say  in  saying  that 
Jesus  is  human,  and  ideally  human?  Former  generations  did  not 
think  of  man  as  we  do.  There  was  dualism  in  the  older  thought  of 
man. 

Does  a  cause  ever  triumph  strictly  on  its  inner  merits?  Is  the 
race  adequate  to  that  sort  of  triumph?  Ideals  which  are  too  high 
for  petty  humanity  must  die  to  live. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS       9 

§4.  The  Christian  Faith  in  God  in  Connection  with  the  Idea 
of  Redemption. 

1.  The  specifically  Christian  faith  in  God  is  inwardly  con- 
nected with  the  faith  in  Christ,  or  the  Christ-faith.     The  con- 
necting link  is   (§3:3)   the  idea  that  the  divine  redemptive 
will  is  realized  through  Christ. 

2.  Jesus  himself  defines  the  salvation  to  be  gained  by  his 
disciples  through  his  message  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  central 
in  his  preaching.     The  expression  "  kingdom  of  God  "  signifies 
rule  of  God,  beginning  through  a  work  of  divine  power,  vic- 
torious over  all  hostile  powers.     It  is  also  intimately  connected 
with  the  promises  and  expectations  of  the  Jewish  people,     (a) 
This  kingdom  of  God  is  proffered  as  a  saving  and  blessed  gift, 
which  includes  a  fulness  of  purely  spiritual  goods.     It  is  prom- 
ised as  such  for  the  coming  age  (atwv  /icAAwv).     Its  goods,  how- 
ever, projected  into  the  present,  are  manifest  wherever  men  in 
filial  confidence  and  in  the  practice  of  love,  imitating  God,  are 
subject  to  the  will  of  God  and  enjoy  his  reign  in  order  to  their 
salvation.1     This    future-present    redemptive    good    was    pro- 
claimed in  the  first  Christian  community  (partly  in  other  ex- 
pressions) as  content  of  the  gospel  of  Christ.     Equally  so  this 
Christian  redemptive  good  has  in  the  later  history  of  Christian- 
ity, although  understood  very  variously,  formed  a  distinguishing 
characteristic  of  the  Christian  religion,     (b)   This  redemptive 
good  of  the  kingdom  of  God  is  as  to  its  content  indissolubly 
connected  with  the  task  and  problem  of  the  perfect  righteous- 
ness (SucatooTJv?/).     Jesus  delineated  this  good  vividly  in  free 
fidelity  toward  the  Old  Testament  commandments.     It  is  not 
an  ascetic  relation,  but  the  love  of  God  and  neighbor,  which  has 
world-abnegation  and  self-abnegation  only  as  its  negative  and 
obverse  side.     The  first  community  further  exemplified  this 
new  law  of  Christ.     It  has  remained  during  subsequent  history 
a  constitutive  factor  of  Christianity,  although  under  manifold 
depletions  and  distortions,  and  under  greatly  changed  cultural 
conditions,      (c)   The  relation  between  the  divine  gift  and  the 
human  task  is  defined  by  Jesus:  the  fulfilment  of  the  divine 
will  is  the  condition  of  the  participation  in  the  full  blessing  of 
God ;  but  God  first  meets  man  with  his  forgiveness  and  educa- 


10      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

tive  blessings,  especially  in  Jesus  Christ  himself  as  bringer  of 
the  kingdom  of  God  (§3:3).  This  conception,  powerfully 
formulated  by  Paul,  has  persisted  in  Christianity,  in  spite  of 
much  fluctuation  and  corruption. 

Note  to  §4 :  2 

1.  The  goods  of  the  Kingdom  were  already  present  to  the  conscious- 
ness of  Jesus,  but  the  Kingdom  was  to  come. 

3.  The  God-idea  which  corresponds  to  Jesus'  original  mes- 
sage of  the  kingdom  of  God  is  expressed  in  the  name  of  God 
as  "  our  Father  in  heaven."  This  name  of  God  has  become 
regulative  for  Christianity  by  virtue  of  its  position  in  the  Lord's 
prayer. 

b.  THE  PECULIARITY  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  LIFE,  AS  AGAINST 
OTHER  SIDES  OF  THE  LIFE  OF  THE  SPIRIT.* 

Note  to  b 

1.  What  do  we  mean  by  the  spiritual  life?  The  aesthetic,  ethical 
and  scientific  are  included.  But  the  religious  is  also  included,  and 
I  know  not  what  else  there  is  in  the  spiritual  life.  Does  the  re- 
ligious connote  something  as  specific  in  the  life  of  the  spirit  as  the 
others  mentioned,  or  is  the  religious  an  attitude  toward  reality  in- 
cluding all  of  these  others? 

§5.  The  Way  to  a  Knowledge  of  the  Essence  of  Religion. 

1.  The  historical  phenomenon  of  Christianity,  whose  content 
we  have  to  present  in  its  most  salient  features,  is  combined  with 
a  series  of  other  historical  phenomena,  under  the  universal  con- 
cept of  religion.     It  serves  the  more  comprehensive  and  more 
accurate  knowledge  of  Christianity  itself,   and  therewith  the 
solution  of  our  problem,  if  we  make  clear  to  ourselves  the  char- 
acter of  the  whole  aspect  of  the  human  spiritual  life  designated 
by  the  name  religion. 

2.  We  may  not  derive  the  essence  of  religion  from  the  un- 
certain etyw.ology  of  the  word,  but  only  from  an  investigation 
of  the  phenomenon  itself,     (a)   But  such  investigation  cannot 
stop  with  an  investigation  of  only  the  most  elementary  forms 
of  religion.1      (b)   A  process  of  induction  would  be  abortive 
which  specified  the  common  marks  of  all  empirically  given 


THE  FOUNDATION  OP  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     11 

religions,  without  distinction.     Such  a  procedure  would  result 
in  a  too  indefinite  universal  concept. 

Note  to  §5 :  2 

1.  One  cannot  understand  the  essence  of  man  from  a  study  of  the 
human  embryo  merely.  A  present  fad  among  scientists  (e.  g.  Lester 
F.  Ward)  is  to  discover  the  essence  of  religion  by  an  embryological 
study  of  religion.  The  resulting  concept  is  extremely  poverty- 
stricken,  as  compared  with  the  richness  and  fulness  of  the  higher 
forms  of  religious  life.  Moreover,  we  are  able  inwardly  to  understand 
foreign  religions  only  from  the  standpoint  of  our  own  religion.  Abso- 
lute impartiality  is  impossible,  but  we  can  enter  sympathetically  into 
what  we  may  suppose  to  be  the  experiences  of  other  religious  people, 
and  compare  them  with  the  religious  life  with  which  we  are  familiar. 

3.  Thus  we  are  led  to  this,  viz.  to  take  our  starting-point  in 
a  definite  content  of  the  historical  life,  and  of  course  in  the 
content  which  is  highest  and  best  known  to  us,  that  is,  there- 
fore, in  the  Christian.  Using  the  Christian  as  a  type,  or 
species,  we  may  investigate  the  specific  character  of  the  reli- 
gious life,  and  to  be  sure,  first  of  all  in  comparison  with  the 
other  sides  of  the  spiritual  life.  When  we  have  once  found 
these  single  features,  we  shall  have  to  indicate  how  they  may 
be  recognized  in  other  religions,  although  effaced  in  many  ways, 
in  many  ways  modified,  perhaps  thoroughly  distorted. 

§6.  The  Salient  Distinguishing  Marks  of  the  Religious  Life. 

1.  The  religious  life,  considered  first  of  all  in  its  Christian 
form,  is  differentiated  from  the  other  sides  of  the  spiritual  life 
by  the  following  characteristics:  (a)  It  is  swayed  and  gov- 
erned in  its  entire  course  by  (<*)  the  certainty  of  a  supramun- 
dane  power  on  which  we,  together  with  the  world,  are  totally 
dependent.  To  be  sure  the  believer  is  able  to  represent  this 
power  only  with  the  aid  of  fantasy.1  But  the  believer  lives 
at  the  same  time  in  the  firm  conviction  that  that  which  is  thus 
represented  is  reality.2  (/?)  To  this  power  is  attributed  a 
morally  binding  authority  over  us.  To  it  is  attributed  also 
decisive  importance  and  inner  participation  in  and  sympathy 
for  us  and  our  life,  primarily  in  and  for  our  blessedness  or  sal- 
vation, (b)  Toward  this  power  accordingly  from  the  human 
side  there  is  a  relation  of  feeling  and  willing  of  a  peculiar 


12      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

character,  viz.  (a)  a  surrender  of  the  will  to  it  in  submission 
and  obedience,  expressed  in  conduct  of  the  life  and  in  worship 
and  prayer;  and  (ft)  a  feeling  of  humble  submission  and  of 
cheerful  confidence,  (c)  In  this  way  a  personal  communion 
is  sought  with  that  supramundane  power  itself.  This  com- 
munion embraces  the  gaining  of  blessedness,  which  is  dependent 
upon  it,  and  a  position  of  freedom  over  against  the  world.3 

Notes  to  §6 : 1 

1.  The  supramundane  power  is  represented  symbolically  by  means 
of  such  expressions  as  "  Rock,"  «  Shield,"  "  High  Tower,"  "  Friend," 
"  Captain,"  "  Pilgrim,"  "  Father." 

2.  Feuerbach  regarded  religious  ideas  as  injurious  illusions;  Lange 
held  that  they  were  useful  illusions.     Now  there  is  a  certain  function 
which  illusion  often  has  in  experience,  but  if  the  believer  should 
come  permanently  to  the  conviction  that  all  the  characteristic  ideas 
of  religion  are  illusion,  the  result  would  be  fatal  for  his  religion. 
Cancel  the  idea-element  in  faith  and  you  destroy  the  faith.     The 
emotional  and  volitional  sides  suffer  atrophy,  it  would  seem,  when 
the  idea-element  is  destroyed. 

3.  The  three  elements  mentioned   in   (a),    (b)    and    (c),   are  the 
three  characterisics  of  the  Christian  religion. 

The  personal  communion  with  the  supramundane  power  and  the 
blessedness  will  not  appear  as  a  donation,  but  as  an  achievement. 

2.  Something  of  all  these  characteristics  must  be  found  every- 
where where  we  speak  of  religion  at  all.  To  be  sure  they  ap- 
pear in  infinitely  many  individual  modifications,  (a)  Every- 
where there  is  the  certainty  of  a  supramundane  power  or  pow- 
ers, and  everywhere  an  authority  laying  claim  to  man,  and  a 
decisive  influence  on  his  life  and  blessedness  are  attributed  to 
that  power  or  powers.  But  infinitely  diverse  is  (a)  the  view  of 
the  supramundaneness  of  that  power  or  powers,  as  also  of  the 
kind  and  extent  of  its  influence,  as  also  again  of  the  kind  and 
degree  of  the  certainty  of  the  existence  and  dominion  of  that 
power  or  powers.1  Infinitely  diverse  also  are  (/?)  the  ground 
of  the  authority  of  that  power  and  the  idea  of  the  content  of 
the  expected  blessedness,  and  of  the  relation  of  that  power  or 
powers  to  that  blessedness,  of  the  conditions  of  obtaining  that 
blessedness.2  (b)  Everywhere  there  is  a  relation  of  will  and 
feeling,  which  is  analogous  to  1  (b)  above.  But  inexhaustibly 
manifold  is  (a)  the  surrender  of  will  in  relation  to  its  inten- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     13 

sity  and  pureness;  and  indefinitely  shaded  and  graded  are  (/?) 
the  feelings  of  submission  and  confidence,  and  their  relation  to 
each  other.3  (c)  Everywhere  there  is  some  sort  of  communion 
with  the  deity  and  dominion  over  the  world  striven  for.  But 
the  former  is  in  various  degrees  of  a  spiritual  and  ethical  char- 
acter. So  is  the  latter  various  in  scope  and  content. 

Notes  to  §6 :  2 

1.  The  diversity  extends  from  Spinoza  at  one  extreme  to  Herrmann, 
the  absolute  dualist  in  theology,  at  the  other. 

2.  In  the  Christian  religion  what  we  have  to  do  with,  ultimately, 
is  a  spiritual  relation,  not  the  holding  of  any  particular  historical 
datum  as  true.     It  is  a  supersensible,  superhistorical  relationship  that 
we  are  concerned  with;  and  the  requiring  of  adhesion  to  any  fact  in 
history  is  subversive  of  the  Christian  religion.     A  jury  of  twelve 
scholars  would  scarcely  agree  on  oath  with  reference  to  any  historical 
fact  in  the  life  of  Christ.     Is  it  not  too  much,  then,  to  require  ad- 
hesion to  this  or  that  historical  fact  in  order  to  be  a  Christian?     Is 
it  not  too  much  to  ask  of  Aunt  Dinah  down  South?     She  cannot  get 
at  the  facts,  unless  she  takes  them  blindly,  like  the  charcoal-man 
whom  Luther  questioned. 

3.  In   view  of  this   diversity,   there   is   ground   for   large-hearted 
charity  on  the  part  of  the  preacher  and  pastor.     There  is  also  need 
of  pedagogic  diversity  in  dealing  with  the  diversity  of  religious  life 
and  development.     Moreover,  there  is  a  call  for  an  optimistic  spirit 
of  appreciation  of  any  degree  of  obedience,  confidence  and  assurance. 

For  example,  referring  to  obedience  toward  God,  it  may  be  shown 
that  the  thirsty  man,  drinking  water,  by  so  much  obeys  God;  that 
the  laborer,  eating  his  dinner,  is  by  so  much  obeying  God.  Any 
degree  of  recognition  of  the  order  of  the  world  and  submission  to  it  is 
recognition  of  God.  We  can  prove  to  the  "  atheist "  that  he  is  not  an 
atheist,  inasmuch  as  he  eats  his  dinner. 

§7.  Human  Need  and  Surrender  to  Divine  Revelation  the  Basis 
of  the  Religious  Life. 

1.  If  in  all  religions  there  are  the  three  characteristics  indi- 
cated, the  further  question  arises  whether  a  unitary  practical 
interest,  i.  e.  interest  in  life,  which  binds  men  to  religion,  is  not 
to  be  found  everywhere  also.1  (a)  The  Christian  religion  be- 
comes inwardly  a  part  of  man  by  awakening  the  practical  ques- 
tion, the  question  of  life,  viz.  Can  I  become  blessed  ?  Can  I 
be  saved?  How  can  I  obtain  eternal  life?  (Cf.  §6:1,  a,  £ 
and  c.)  (b)  But  all  other  religions  reckon  with  man's  desire 


14      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

for  (positive)  happiness,  or  at  least  (negative)  liberation  from 
definite  evils,  or  human  need  and  sin  in  general ;  and  it  is  pre- 
cisely in  this  that  they  have  their  root  in  the  heart  of  their 
adherents.  It  is  from  this  standpoint  that  all  the  particular 
characters  specified  in  §6:2  are  to  be  understood. 

Note  to  §7 : 1 

1.  What  we  refer  to  is  an  interest  of  life,  rather  than  of  specula- 
tion.    The  distinction  is  not  an  absolute  one,  to  be  sure,  but  religion 
is  concerned  with  practical,  rather  than  theoretical  interests.     It  did 
not  come  to  satisfy  theoretical  interests,  and  even  its  doctrines  came 
to  satisfy  practical  needs.     The  theoretical  interest  is  present,  but 
the  primary  interest  is  practical. 

2.  But  this  desire  which  is  powerful  in  all  religions  and  all 
manifestations  of  their  life  does  not  perhaps  generate  the  gods 
as  mere  "wish-beings"    (Wunschwesen).1     Rather  the  pious 
man  not  only  in  Christianity  but  also  in  all  other  religions 
knows  himself  to  be  bound  by  divine  authority  and  demonstra- 
tion of  power,  and  he  holds  himself  to  definite  impressive  dis- 
closures of  supramundane  power  or  powers,  in  other  words  to 
"  revelations."     The  man  who  desires  blessedness  does  not  pur- 
posely create  the  gods,  but  finds  them,  lights  upon  them,  as  we 
say;  and  this  is  the  case  in  the  various  religions  of  the  phe- 
nomenal world.2 

Notes  to  §7:2 

1.  When  a  person  or  a  people  is  in  dire  need  of  help,  does  desire 
of  rescue  generate  the  rescuer,  in  the  sense  that  the  wish  is  father  of 
the  thought?     The  idea  of  a  rescuer  has  a  psychological  origin,  and 
so  is  generated ;  but  we  are  speaking  of  the  being  to  whom  the  idea 
is  referred.     God  is  felt  to  have  authority.     The  authority-feeling  is 
psychologically  generated,  of  course;  but  is  the  authority  of  no  ob- 
jective validity? 

Theoretically,  we  must  consider  the  contention  that  we  cannot  tell 
whether  the  gods  are  mere  Wiinschwesen  or  not.  But  practically  it  is 
quite  different.  The  only  way  one  has  religious  assurance  is  prac- 
tically. And  while  one  may  not  be  able  to  prove  or  disprove  the 
objective  validity  of  the  belief  in  the  authority  of  God  on  speculative 
grounds,  practically  one  may  become  assured  of  it. 

2.  It  is  when  practical  religion  weakens  that  the  question  seriously 
arises  as  to  whether  the  gods  are  "  wish-beings  "  or  not. 

3.  Faith  in  such  divine  revelations  is  further  upborne  and 
sustained  in  all  religions  by  religious  communions.     On  the 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHEISTIAN  DOGMATICS     15 

basis  of  the  revelations  believed  in,  the  various  religious  com- 
munions cherish  in  their  circles  definite  religious  views  of  God 
or  the  gods,  of  the  world  and  of  life;  also  certain  sentiments, 
certain  tendencies  of  the  will,  customs,  commandments,  prom- 
ises and  expectations ;  and  these  communions  are  held  together 
on  their  side  by  this  common  possession. 

§8.  The- Importance  of  Feeling  in  Religion,  and  the  Character 
of  the  Religious  Judgment  as  Value- Judgment. 

1.  All  the  main  psychic  functions,  ideation  and  judgment  as 
well  as  feeling  and  willing,  participate  in  religion,  no  less  than 
in  all  the  unitary  activities  of  our  spiritual  life.1  This  is  true 
of  Christianity,  but  also  of  the  other  religions.  Nevertheless 
Schleiermacher  was  not  wrong  in  assigning  to  feeling  a  central 
place  in  the  religious  life.2  For  the  ideas  belonging  to  religion, 
ideas  of  God  and  of  the  world,  tendencies  of  the  will  and  deeds, 
are  expressions  of  personal  piety  in  full  measure  only  when 
they  are  apprehended  in  feeling,  or  better  expressed,  in  what  the 
Bible  means  by  "  heart,"  according  to  their  importance  or  their 
worth  for  the  unitary  personal  life  of  man.  In  other  words, 
all  this  emerges  from  the  reaction  of  the  whole  heart. 

Notes  to  §8 : 1 

1.  An  extreme  Ritschlian  tendency  has  urged  that  the  intellectual 
movement  is  practically  absent  in  religion.     But  that  is  psycholog- 
ically impossible. 

2.  Starbuck,  reviewing  James's  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience, 
says  that  feeling  is  but  the  splash  of  the  spray  on  the  ocean  of  life. 
There  is  some  basis  for  this,  and  yet  the  centrality  of  feeling  in 
religion  must  be  maintained. 

2.  It  has  become  customary  in  theology  to  express  the  inti- 
mate relation  of  religious  ideas  and  judgments  to  the  heart  that 
perceives  values,  by  the  proposition  that  all  religious  cognition 
terminates  in  value-judgments.  This  proposition  is  true  and 
right,  only  under  two  conditions,  viz. :  (a)  The  concept  value- 
judgment  is  not  to  be  opposed  to  the  concept  existence-judgment. 
Rather  is  it  essential  to  a  judgment  of  faith  to  affirm  a  reality 
(v.  §6:1  a  and  2  b).1  (b)  Faith-judgments,  especially  the 
Christian  faith-judgments,  may  not  be  understood  as  express- 
ing that  reality  in  the  sense  of  a  mere  postulate  which  must  be 


16      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

drawn  up  on  account  of  its  worth.  Rather  faith-judgments 
affirm  that  reality  on  the  basis  of  disclosures  in  the  given  world, 
or  of  revelations  (v.  §7:  2).2  But  under  these  two  conditions 
the  characterization  of  the  propositions  of  faith  as  value- judg- 
ments has  its  objective  right.  For  they  are  not  theoretical 
judgments,  whose  validity  reposes  on  the  necessitations  of  per- 
ception and  thought,  but,  according  to  their  epistemological 
significance  they  are  "  thymetic  "  judgments,3  whose  validity 
reposes  on  the  attitude  of  the  feeling  and  willing  ego  to  the 
ideated  objects,  i.  e.  on  an  evaluation  of  revelation.  More  ac- 
curately, value-judgments  are  confidence  judgments,  or  trust- 
judgments,  in  many  religions  fear- judgments.4 

Notes  to  §8 : 2 

1.  This  in  opposition  to  the  type  of  Ritschlianism  represented  by 
Bender. 

2.  This  in  opposition  to  Kant 

3.  Cf.  Reischle:     Werturteile  und  Glaubensurteile. 

4.  Note  the  difference  between  what  "  the  world  "  means  to  the  man 
of  religion,  and  what  it  means  to  the  man  of  science ;  between  "  man  " 
from  the  point  of  view  of  anthropology,  and  "  man  "  from  the  point 
of  view  of  religion.     Even  if  the  value-judgment  be  an  existence  judg- 
ment, it  is  not  as  existence  judgment  that  you  think  of  it. 

3.  Within  the  religious  community  faith-judgments  consid- 
ered psychologically,  not  epistemologically,  are  constantly  in 
danger  of  sacrificing  their  character  as  value- judgments,  and  of 
becoming  an  object  of  assent  without  the  participation  of  the 
evaluating  "  heart,"  1  precisely  as  religious  acts  are  in  danger 
of  deteriorating  to  mere  legal  or  customary  external  acts. 

Note  to  §8 :  3 

1.  This  is  what  is  meant  by  "  intellectualism  "  in  religion.  It  is 
adhesion  to  a  set  of  ideas  or  formulas,  theoretically,  where  there  is  no 
corresponding  religious  process  in  consciousness.  It  is  the  evil  of 
both  rationalism  and  orthodoxy. 

There  is  a  place  for  intellectual  assent  in  religion.  But  religious 
judgments  have  a  practical  origin,  and  they  have  no  values  apart 
from  the  religious  process  in  consciousness  which  structurally  pro- 
duces the  religious  idea.  What  is  the  good  of  the  God-idea  without 
religion?  What  is  the  good  of  the  flag  without  patriotism  f  (Of 
course  the  flag  shows  that  there  was  patriotism  once  upon  a  time!) 
Of  what  use  is  it  to  be  on  my  knees,  if  there  is  no  prayerfulness  in 
my  spirit?  There  is  constant  danger  that  the  fixed,  static  God-idea 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     17 

may  be  out  of  relation  with  experience,  through  failure  to  reconstruct 
the  God-idea  ever  anew  as  a  mode  of  expressing  our  new  values  and 
our  reactions  to  the  world  and  human  history. 

4.  The  character  of  religious  value-judgments  becomes  more 
distinct  still  when  we  assign  them  their  place  in  the  scale  of 
value- judgments  in  general.  These  value-judgments  may  be 
classified  as  follows:  (a)  Natural  or  hedonistic  value-judg- 
ments, which  we  form  on  the  basis  of  natural  inclination  and 
impulse  and  of  the  ends  growing  out  of  these,  (b)  Legal 
value-judgments,  which  we  exact  on  the  basis  of  the  rules  of 
right,  and  of  our  position  in  society,  (c)  Ideal  or  normative 
value-judgments,  which  we  express  on  the  basis  of  ideas,  or 
norms,  and  therefore  with  the  claim  to  universal  validity. 
These  ideal  value-judgments  are  (a)  aesthetic,  (/8)  intellectual, 
(y)  moral,  and  (8)  religious. 

§9.  The  Relation  of  Religion  to  the  Other  Spiritual  Activities 
of  Man,  i.  e.  to  the  Aesthetic,  the  Scientific  and  the  Moral. 

1.  The  value-judgments  specified  in  §8:4  are  only  the  ex- 
pression or  exhibit  of  man's  corresponding  practical  activities, 
or  reactions.     In  particular,  the  ideal  value-judgments  men- 
tioned in  §8:4  (c)  are  the  manifestation  or  exhibition  of  the 
human  spiritual  life,  according  to  its  various  sides,  aesthetic, 
scientific,  moral  and  religious.1     It  is  important  to  relate  re- 
ligion to  these  other  three  reactions  of  spiritual  life. 

Note  to  §9 : 1 

1.  There  is  difference  as  well  as  kinship  between  the  religious  func- 
tion and  other  functions  of  the  human  spirit.  The  modern  tendency 
to  monism  must  not  interfere  with  fidelity  to  facts  and  the  disparate- 
ness of  spiritual  facts.  Only  when  we  have  recognized  multiplicity 
have  we  the  problem  of  monism  on  our  hands. 

2.  The  (Esthetic-spiritual  activity  rests  on  this,  viz.  that  by 
means  of  the  complex  of  ideas  which  nature  proffers  or  art 
creates,  the  free  play  of  our  fantasy  and  at  the  same  time  of 
our  sensations  and  feelings  is  excited  and  thereby  an  frsthetic 
pleasure  awakened.     Now  without  doubt,  religion  has  a  cer- 
tain similarity  to  the  aesthetic  elevation  of  feelings,  and  re- 
ligion has  ever  employed  art  as  a  means  of  expression  and 


18      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

manifestation.  Because  of  this  religion  and  art  are  often  con- 
founded. But  in  essence  they  are  very  different.1  In  aesthetic 
life  it  is  the  relation  of  the  ideated  object  to  fantasy  that  comes 
into  consideration.  The  question  of  the  reality  of  that  object 
is  incidental.  But  in  the  religious  life  everything  depends  upon 
the  practical  question  of  our  blessedness,  our  salvation  in  some 
sense  of  the  word,  and  therefore  upon  the  reality  of  the  supra- 
mundane  power  or  powers  of  which  we  form  ideas.2 

Notes  to  §9:2 

1.  In  much  of  worship  of  a  higher,  sacramental  order  there  is 
aesthetic  rather  than  religious  elevation.     The  apprehension  of  the 
peculiar  religious  object  is  wanting.     The  ethical  authority  of  that 
object  also  is  consequently  wanting.     The  sense  of  harmony  is  present, 
but  that  is  a  truncated  religious  experience.     The  roots  are  not  there. 
Art  has  aestheticised  the  Cross,  and  religion  makes  use  of  this,  but 
the  attitude  of  the  religious  man  is  different  from  that  of  the  mere 
artist,  as  the  attitude  of  the  thirsty  man  toward  water  is  different 
from  that  of  the  artist  who  is  not  thirsty. 

2.  Religion  may  externalize  itself  in  aesthetic  forms,  e.  g.,  in  music, 
architecture,  vestments,  cross,   and  cult;  but  aesthetics  is  not  con- 
cerned with  the  reality  of  the  object  set  forth  aesthetically.     Religion, 
on  the  other  hand,  is  fundamentally  concerned  with  this. 

But  by  no  definitive  scientific  proof  can  you  compel  a  man  to  hold 
that  God  exists.  Indeed,  as  Schultz  points  out,  in  his  Grundriss  der 
christlichen  Apologetik,  much  of  the  power  and  blessedness  of  re- 
ligion depends  upon  the  fact  that  scientific  proof  is  impossible. 
Otherwise  one  might  be  made  pious  as  one  is  made  mathematical. 
If  the  proof  of  religion  were  scientific,  then  impiety  would  be  mere 
nonsense.  The  remedy  for  doubt  and  the  fear  of  subjective  illusion 
is  mainly  practical;  it  is  to  live  deeply  and  fully  on  one's  religious 
possessions  and  in  the  experiencing  of  their  values. 

3.  Scientific  activity  is  guided  by  the  ideal  of  truth  and 
sets  out  from  a  comprehensive  cognition  of  the  real.1     In  re- 
ligion also,  in  the  propositions  or  tenets  or  articles  of  faith, 
the  question  as  to  the  truth,  and  therefore  as  to  the  reality  of 
that    which    is    believed,    is    essential.2     Therefore    an    intel- 
lectualistic  tendency  can  constantly  take  root  in  religion.8     But 
leading  interests,  proof  of  truth,  content  and  goal  of  truth  in 
religion  and  in  its  faith-judgments  are  of  a  different  kind, 
according  to  §8:2,  from  what  they  are  in  science  and  in  its 
formulas. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     19 

Notes  to  §9:3 

1.  Science  "knows  no  law  but  its  own,  and  no  authority  but  truth. 
It  wants  the  truth,   the  whole  truth,   and  nothing  but  the  truth. 
Science  cannot  stand  unveraciousness,  subjectively,  or  untruth,  ob- 
jectively.   Is  that  as  true  in  religion  as  it  is  in  science? 

2.  If  one  is  persuaded  that  the  traditional  tenet  is  not  true,  he  may 
keep  the  form  and  stuff  it  with  a  new  content.     If  he  cannot  do 
this,  he  will  give  it  up,  even  if  he  thinks  he  will  go  to  the  devil  for  it. 
John  Stuart  Mill  said  he  would  not  hold  that  that  was  right  for 
God  which  would  be  wrong  for  man,  and  if  God  would  send  him  to 
hell  for  that,  to  hell  he  would  go. 

3.  Intellectualism   is   the   worst  one-sidedness   in   religion.     It   is 
worse  than  either  emotionalism  or  moralism. 

4.  Even  the  moral  life  is  essentially  different  from  the  reli- 
gious.    The  former  is  guided  by  the  thought  of  the  "  ought," 
that  is,  a  rule  of  human  relationship  and  conduct,  acknowl- 
edged to  be  unconditioned  and  universally  valid;  or,  in  other 
words,  the  moral  life  is  guided  by  the  idea  of  the  good.     Re- 
ligion on  the  other  hand  is  related  to  a  real  supramundane 
power,  authoritative  for  us,  ordering,  disposing,  guiding  our 
lives.     Religion  therefore  is  ruled  by  the  thought,  not  of  the 
good,  but  of  the  Supreme  Being,  and  at  the  same  time  by  the 
idea  of  the  chief  good.     Ethics  as  such  does  not  need  to  relate 
itself  to  a  supramundane  object ;  but  in  Christianity  the  reli- 
gious and  the  moral  are  in  the  most  intimate  relations  to  one 
another.     In  this  their  reciprocal  penetration,  they  form  that 
activity  of  the  human  personality  which  is  ethical,  that  is, 
guided  by  norms  for  the  will,  and  free.     In  other  religions  the 
connection  with  the  moral  life,  therefore  the  ethical  personal 
character  of  the  religion,  is  attained  only  in  very  various  de- 
grees. 

5.  Religion  is  allied  with  all  these  spiritual  activities.     In 
the  latter  as  in  the  former,  man  as  spiritual  being  seeks  to 
mount   above  mere   naturality,   mere   natural   conditionedness 
or  determinedness,  although  in  very  various  degrees,  to  be  sure.1 
But  in  this  whole  matter  religion  occupies  a  special  position 
over  against  all  other  sides   of  the   spiritual   life.     Religion 
would   put   human    life   into   relation   with   a    supramundane 
reality.     This  striking  difference  between  religion  and  the  rest 
of  the  cultural  life  is  manifest  in  the  history  of  humanity,  and 


20     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  the  strained  relation  of  religion  again  and  again  to  the  en- 
tire secular  culture.2 

Notes  to  §9 :  5 

1.  Of  science  itself  the  real  spiritual  function  is  simply  the  mount- 
ing of  the  human  spirit  above  naturality,  inner  and  outer;  it  is  the 
achieving  of  a  certain  supramundaneness.     The  spiritual  function  of 
art  is  the  spirit's  mounting  above  the  rawness   and   ugliness   and 
repulsiveness  of  much  of  our  empirical  life  —  again  the  becoming 
supramundane  of  human  personality.     Similar  things  may  be  said  of 
morality  and  religion. 

2.  The  nub  of  the  conflict  between  religion  and  science  was  that 
science  wanted  dependableness  and  system,  and  it  could  not  get  on 
with  the  religious  object,  so  it  undertook  to  eliminate  that  object. 

But  the  most  pitiable  conflict  is  the  conflict  between  religion  and 
morality,  a  conflict  which  is  going  on  today.  Many  men  who  are 
most  interested  in  the  moral  function  today  are  not  quite  clear  about 
the  religious  function.  They  try  to  show  the  identity  of  the  two, 
yet  the  conflict  persists.  Morality  wants  religion  to  do  away  with 
the  supramundane  object  and  take  the  moral  ideal  as  its  object. 
Religion  can  not  do  it,  and  it  would  ruin  morality  in  the  long  run 
if  it  did. 

History  ought  to  be  worth  something  to  us.  In  the  entire  history 
of  religion  there  has  been  present  without  exception  a  power  outside 
of  the  human  power,  which  is  best  designated  therefore  by  the  word 
"supramundane,"  a  power,  or  powers,  or  being,  in  which  man  has 
believed.  This  is  an  inalienable  feature  of  religion,  high  and  low, 
at  home  and  abroad,  millennium  after  millennium. 

Now  this  is  what  the  modern  moral  man  is  trying  to  get  rid  of. 
Modern  morality,  with  its  ideal  which  has  grown  up  out  of  experi- 
ence, now  wants  to  be  content  for  the  specifically  religious  conscious- 
ness also.  But  the  moral  function  and  the  religious  function  are  not 
identical.  Our  moral  function  consists  in  the  production  of  values, 
goods.  Religion  is  the  conviction  that  the  structure  and  function  of 
the  universe  are  such  as  to  render  the  production  of  values  (moral 
values  included)  possible.  We  would  not  sow  wheat  if  we  were  con- 
vinced that  the  field  would  not  grow  wheat;  nor  would  we  be  so  likely 
to  produce  moral  values,  if  we  thought  the  universe  was  against 
these  values.  Thus  the  religious  conviction  is  implicit  in  the  moral, 
aesthetic  and  scientific  life.  But  my  production  of  aesthetic  values 
is  different  from  my  conviction  about  the  universe,  even  though  the 
two  are  intimately  related.  Similarly,  morality  is  not  religion,  nor 
religion  morality;  and  yet  religion  without  morality  would  become 
less  religious,  and  morality  without  religion  less  moral.  The  divorce 
of  morality  and  religion  would  be  the  destruction  of  hoth  —  not 
necessarily  for  the  individual,  but  for  society  and  the  race. 

Religion  is  not  always  worship  of  a  personal  God,  to   be  sure. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     21 

Take  Buddhism,  for  instance.  It  staggers  the  man  who  tries  to 
define  religion,  and  there  is  a  temptation  to  treat  it  as  a  philosophy, 
rather  than  a  religion.  It  is  a  philosophy,  but  it  is  also  a  religion. 
What,  then,  is  the  religious  object  in  Buddhism?  It  believes  in 
gods,  spirits  and  ghosts,  but  its  belief  in  them  is  not  a  religious 
belief.  Buddha  did  not  believe  himself  to  be  dependent  on  them. 
But  he  had  an  object  on  which  he  believed  both  gods  and  men  to 
be  dependent,  and  with  which  he  sought  harmony.  That  object  was 
the  moral  order  of  the  world.  The  moral  order  of  the  world  func- 
tioned for  Buddha  as  God  functions  for  us.  Whence  comes  the  moral 
order?  Buddha  did  not  ask  that  question,  for  the  same  reason  that 
the  theist  does  not  ask,  Whence  comes  God?  Where  we  ask  about 
the  ground  of  the  moral  order  of  the  world,  the  Buddhist  would  ask 
about  the  ground  of  the  existence  of  God. 

Now  the  religious  object  of  original  Buddhism,  the  moral  order 
of  the  world,  being  impersonal,  worship,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of 
the  term,  was  not  called  for.  Is  cult,  then,  a  sine  qua  non  of  religion? 
In  religion  there  is  (1)  belief  in  a  supramundane  being,  or  power, 
or  powers;  (2)  man  feels  himself  dependent  upon  that  being,  or 
power,  or  those  powers;  (3)  he  seeks  to  be  in  harmony  with  that 
object  (being,  power,  or  powers)  ;  and  (4)  in  that  harmony  he  finds 
his  freedom.  Cult  comes  in  in  connection  with  the  third  of  these, 
the  seeking  of  harmony  with  the  religious  object.  In  present-day 
Christianity  cult  is  suffering  eclipse,  because  of  the  passing  of  the 
old  theory  of  redemption.  Historically,  the  purpose  of  cult  has  been 
to  get  God  on  our  side,  by  giving  gifts  or  doing  something.  It  was 
not  originally  to  get  ourselves  into  harmony  with  God,  but  to  get 
that  being  or  power  into  harmony  with  us.  But  if  that  power  is 
external  and  changeless,  as  in  Buddhism,  what  is  the  good  of  cult? 
It  could  be  subjectively  serviceable  only,  enabling  the  individual  to 
get  into  harmony  with  the  religious  object. 

Has  cult  any  other  than  this  subjective  value,  and  if  we  say  it 
has  not,  will  cult  survive  the  change  in  point  of  view?  The  Old 
Testament  prophets  criticized  the  people  for  offering  cult  (sacrifices, 
feasts  and  fasts,  and  prayers)  instead  of  morality.  Lincoln  was  not 
so  much  concerned  with  the  question  whether  God  was  on  his  side  as 
with  the  question  whether  he  was  on  God's  side.  The  stars  do  not 
go  out  of  their  course  for  any  man ;  does  prayer  effect  any  change  in 
God?  Would  you  be  willing  to  assume  responsibility  for  all  the 
consequences  of  the  literal  fulfilment  of  your  petitions?  Is  not  the 
ultimate  prayer,  "  Not  my  will,  but  thine  be  done  "  ?  It  is  not  meant, 
however,  that  the  effect  of  prayer  is  merely  "  reflex  " ;  but  rather  that 
there  is  at  bottom  a  point  where  the  divine  and  the  human  will  are 
one  (for  otherwise  God  would  be  a  fractional  God  only),  and  that 
true  prayer  is  an  expression  of  our  deepest  and  truest  life,  which  is 
God's  life  in  us.  It  is  not  an  external  deed,  something  that  we  go 
about  doing;  it  is  the  normal  functioning  of  our  spiritual  life,  the 


22     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

most  fundamental  activity  of  spiritual  life.  Does  it  pay  to  pray? 
There  is  something  almost  blasphemous  about  the  question.  As  well 
might  one  ask,  Does  it  pay  to  admire  the  rainbow?  or,  Does  it  pay 
to  love?  It  is  like  supposing  that  the  only  value  of  a  work  of  art  is 
its  money  value.  There  is  no  value,  so  far  as  getting  things  is  con- 
cerned, in  getting  down  on  our  knees  and  asking  for  them.  "  Your 
Father  knoweth  that  ye  have  need  of  these  things."  But  there  is 
value  in  giving  form  and  expression,  externalization  and  realization 
to  the  prayer-life. 

Buddhism,  as  we  have  seen,  is  peculiar  in  having  as  its  religious 
object  the  moral  order  of  the  world.  Would  not  modern  natural  sci- 
ence find  it  easier  to  affiliate  itself  with  the  Buddhistic  than  with 
the  Christian  point  of  view?  What  room  is  there  anyway  for  a  God 
who  is  disparate  from  the  natural  and  moral  order  of  the  world? 
And  if  we  were  to  insist  on  Buddhists  adopting  the  idea  of  a  personal 
God,  without  any  change  in  their  whole  view  of  the  world,  might  we 
not  be  forcing  upon  them  a  lower  category  than  their  own?  Even 
in  Christianity  have  we  not  had  a  thousand  years  of  history  in  which 
the  highest  category  was  not  personality,  but  substance  (ovaia)  ? 

Either  God  is  person,  essentially  as  we  know  personality,  or,  so  far 
as  we  are  concerned,  God  is  not  personal  at  all.  And  if  we  strip  off 
the  attribute  of  personality  from  God,  we  have  not  much  left.  If 
we  say  God's  personality  is  like  ours,  we  are  picturing  God  to  our- 
selves by  means  of  a  symbol  which  is  doubtless  inadequate,  but  not 
necessarily  erroneous.  If  we  say  God's  personality  is  not  like  ours, 
we  land  in  agnosticism.  If  God  is  personal,  and  personality  is  what 
we  find  in  man,  is  not  God  also  more  than  that  ?  The  trouble  here  is 
that  we  cannot  put  any  content  into  the  notion  of  "  super-person- 
ality," except  a  sub-personal  content.  It  is  our  right  to  use  the 
highest  category  we  have  to  set  forth  God,  and  that  highest  category 
is  personality.  And  as  for  the  modern  cutting  out  of  the  God-idea, 
it  is  so  radical  and  so  foreign  to  the  Christian  religion  that  I  do  not 
recognize  it. 

If  Christianity  keeps  on  retiring  our  convictions  regarding  God 
and  immortality  in  favor  of  the  modern  emphasis  upon  sanitation, 
education,  regard  for  natural  law,  and  the  like,  will  there  be  any 
great  difficulty  in  unifying  Christianity  with  Buddhism?  Will  our 
religion  stand  the  stripping  off  from  our  faith  of  the  belief  in 
immortality?  Is  it  personal  immortality  enough  if  my  spiritual 
effectiveness  persists  forever?  Or  is  it  essential  that  I  myself  be 
there? 

§10.  Examination  of  Deviating  Conceptions  of  Religion,  and 
Comprehensive  Definition. 

1.  The  results  of  our  religio-psychological  analysis  (§§6  to 
9)  are  in  conflict  with  various  other  conceptions  of  religion. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     23 

In  these  latter  there  are  justifiable  moments,  indeed,  though 
presented  in  a  one-sided  manner,  (a)  The  results  to  which 
we  attain  are  in  conflict  with  the  theoretical  conception  of  re- 
ligion as  advocated  in  recent  times  on  the  one  side  by  the 
speculative  philosophy  (the  Hegel  notion  that  religion  is  an 
expression  of  philosophical  truth  in  the  form  of  imaginative 
representation,  Vorstellung),  on  the  other  side  by  empirical 
investigation  (religion  an  element  of  the  interest  in  causation, 
v.  §9:3).  All  this  is  too  intellectualistic.1  (b)  These  re- 
sults are  in  conflict  with  the  aesthetic-mystical  conception,  e.  g. 
that  in  Schleiermacher's  Discourses,  especially  the  first  edi- 
tion, reflected  in  his  later  definition  of  religion  as  feeling  of 
dependence.2  This  conception  is  also  combined  with  the  the- 
oretical interpretation  of  religion,  and  Hegel  himself  is  not 
free  from  this  combination  (cf.  §9:2).  (c)  These  results 
are  in  conflict  again  with  a  one-sided  endsemonistic  concep- 
tion, such  as  that  of  Feuerbach.  Such  a  conception  is  not 
just  to  the  importance  of  faith  in  revelation,  i.  e.  it  is  not 
true  to  the  objective  reference  of  religion,  nor  is  it  just  to  the 
interaction  of  religion  and  morality  on  the  other  hand  (v. 
§7:2;  §9:4).  (d)  These  results  are  in  conflict,  again,  with 
the  one-sided  moralistic  or  rigoristic  conception,  e.  g.  of  Kant, 
and  on  the  part  of  rationalism  (v.  §9:4).8  (e)  These  re- 
sults are  in  conflict  with  the  combination  of  different  concep- 
tions, without  any  clear  point  of  unity,  as  is  found,  for  exam- 
ple in  Biedermann  (cf.  §7:  I).4 

Notes  to  §10 : 1 

1.  Here  religion  would  be  primitive  science,  or  (with  Hegel)  primi- 
tive philosophy. 

2.  Man  is  active  in  religion,  not  merely  dependent. 

3.  Kant's  definition  of  religion  as  the  treating  of  human  duties 
as  divine  commands,  fails  to  do  justice  to  the  feeling  of  dependence, 
to  the  revelation-concept,  and  to  cult  (if  cult  is  to  be  regarded  as 
belonging  essentially  to  religion). 

4.  Biedermann  tries  to  ride  two  horses  which  are  not  always  going 
in  the  same  direction. 

2.  We  may  now  combine  the  characteristics  of  the  religious 
life  in  its  developed  form  as  set  forth  in  §§6  to  9  as  follows: 
Religion  is  faith  in  spiritual  being,  or  beings,  or  powers,  or 


24      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

power,  ruling  outside  of  and  above  the  sphere  of  man ;  feeling 
of  dependence  on  these  powers,  and  the  need  of  getting  into 
harmony  with  them  (which,  when  accomplished,  brings  free- 
dom and  peace).  Or,  more  fully,  religion  is  man's  seeking 
communion  with  a  supramundane  power,  or  powers,  which  lay 
claim  to  him  and  determine  his  life,  a  seeking  which  is  nur- 
tured within  a  community,  consummated  in  ideas  and  judg- 
ments of  faith,  in  feelings  of  reverence  and  trust,  as  well  as  in 
surrender  of  the  will  and  in  worshipful  acts.  This  seeking 
has  its  roots  in  the  worth-perceiving  heart  and  in  the  desire 
for  blessedness  on  the  part  of  man,  and  it  is  evoked  by  impres- 
sions due  to  disclosures  of  that  power  in  the  real  world.  In 
brief,  religion  is  the  uplift  of  man  to  the  supramundane,  an 
uplift  that  is  practically  conditioned  and  of  a  practical  kind.1 

Note  to  §10:2 

1.  Are  worshipful  acts  instinctive  and  organic  in  the  religious 
consciousness,  and  so,  abiding?  Or  are  they  a  passing  phase  in  re- 
ligious expression?  The  philosopher,  as  such,  has  no  cult.  Has  he 
gone  astray,  or  will  religion  come  to  this?  Has  religion  a  right  to 
have  its  own  peculiar  way  of  expressing  itself,  as  art  has,  and  as  mor- 
ality has?  Or  will  moral  acts  be  the  expression  of  religion?  Must 
you  have  a  flag  for  there  to  be  patriotism?  I  am  in  doubt  about  the 
whole  matter;  but  while  I  believe  in  moral  service  as  the  expression 
of  religion,  I  believe  that  worshipful  acts  are  instinctive  and  spon- 
taneous. They  have  place,  not  because  they  pay  in  getting  the  Deity 
to  do  something,  and  not  because  they  pay  in  superinducing  a  mental 
condition,  but  for  the  same  reason  that  the  lamb  plays  on  the  hill- 
side in  the  sunshine,  or  the  child  goes  to  its  mother,  or  the  chick 
lifts  up  its  head.  Worshipful  acts  are  the  organic  and  proper  way 
of  expressing  religious  emotions. 

§11.  The  Question  as  to  the  Origin  of  Religion. 

1.  Our  religio-psychological  analysis  setting  out  from  Chris- 
tianity attempted  to  elucidate  the  religious  life  of  man  given 
as  fact,  and  the  life  of  humanity  in  the  sense  of  religion. 
But  the  question  as  to  the  origin  or  rise  of  religion  in  the 
individual  man  and  in  humanity  is  a  different  question  from 
this.1 

Note  to  §11 : 1 

1.  It  is  not  the  business  of  dogmatics  to  do  the  historical  and 
psychological  work  in  connection  with  this  problem,  but  to  formulate 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHKISTIAN  DOGMATICS     25 

the  net  results  of  such  investigation,  and  to  employ  those  results 
in  its  own  task. 

An  interesting  contribution  has  just  been  made  by  L.  von  Schroeder 
in  an  essay  entitled  " Der  Ursprung  der  Religion"  in  a  volume 
entitled  Beitrdge  zur  weiter  Entwickelung  der  christlichen  Religion 
(Munich,  1905).  He  agrees  that  nature-worship  and  soul-cult  (v. 
H.  Spencer  and  J.  Lippert)  have  been  factors  in  the  genesis  of  re- 
ligion, but  claims  that  religion  has  had  another  root,  more  important 
than  these  two.  He  refers  to  the  widespread  faith,  even  among  the 
lowest  peoples,  in  a  supreme,  good  Being,  thought  of  as  creative, 
and  requiring  altruistic  morality  of  the  individual,  a  Being  re- 
garded as  not  demanding  any  definite  cult,  but  as  being  worshipped 
when  one  did  right  and  good  (cf.  A.  Lang;  The  Making  of  Religion). 
Schroeder  finds  the  roots  of  altruistic  ethics  in  the  animal  kingdom, 
in  instinctive  love,  mutual  help,  subordination  to  a  common  end, 
and  the  instinct  of  self-sacrifice  of  the  individual  for  the  species,  as 
when  the  parent  risks  life  for  the  protection  of  its  offspring.  The 
theory  as  to  the  origin  of  religion  is  then  developed  as  follows: 
When  in  the  course  of  evolution  there  appeared  an  individual  re- 
flective enough,  after  feeling  the  power  of  the  inherited  altruistic 
animal  instinct  leading  into  recognized  danger  and  suffering,  to 
raise  the  question,  Why  do  we  do  this?  Why  must  the  individual  sacri- 
fice itself?  the  answer  would  not  be  in  terms  of  the  psychology  of 
instinct,  of  course,  but  would  probably  take  the  form  of  the  sugges- 
tion, There  must  be  some  one  who  wills  that  we  act  in  this  manner. 
He  is  not  to  be  seen,  yet  he  must  be  the  greatest  and  mightiest  and 
highest,  since  all  must  follow  his  will  without  seeing  or  hearing 
him.  Then,  if  these  primitive  thinkers  conceived  the  simple  thought 
that  this  great  Being  must  be  the  one  who  made  the  world  and 
man,  they  would  be  led  to  conclude  that  he  must  be  friendly,  since  he 
had  made  so  much  for  man.  Thus  the  thought  arose  of  the  supreme, 
good  Being,  whose  will  was  the  law  of  self-sacrificing  morality  for 
man.  It  was  the  great  birth  hour  of  humanity  as  humanity,  the 
real  birth  hour  of  religion  and  the  real  birth  hour  of  morals  in 
human  understanding. 

Now  if  this  theory  of  Schroeder  is  historically  correct  and  can  be 
made  out,  it  is  very  important  for  our  task.  It  is  true  that  nature- 
worship  and  soul-cult  do  not  quite  explain  the  genesis  of  the  moral 
in  religion.  But  this  theory  would  mean  that  the  kernel  of  the 
faith  is  indissolubly  bound  up  with  the  moral,  with  the  idea  of  the 
good.  It  puts  a  stop  to  the  modern  cry  that  religion  and  morality 
can  be  divorced,  and  it  indicates  that  on  fundamental  problems  the 
primitive  answer  was  essentially  that  of  our  most  profound  philosophy. 
We  have  here  too  a  further  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  what 
Christianity  has  most  feared  often  turns  out  to  be  a  foundation  stone 
indispensable  to  it.  A  generation  ago  the  evolutionary  hypothesis 
produced  a  panic  in  religion.  Now  it  would  seem  that  the  only 


26     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

adequate  defense  of  the  Christian  religion  involves  the  evolutionary 
hypothesis.  Here  we  have  an  evolutionary  vindication  of  the  view 
that  altruistic  good  is  organic,  structural,  original  in  life.  We 
cannot  make  the  transition  (logically)  from  abstract  egoism  to  ab- 
stract altruism,  but  here  we  are  able  from  an  evolutionary  point  of 
view,  to  explain  (psychologically)  how  an  egoistic  person  can  make 
the  transition  to  altruism. 

2.  The  origin  of  religion  in  the  individual  man  is  every- 
where  mediated   by   religious   tradition   and   education.     But 
such  origin  presupposes  an  original  endowment  in  man,  i.  e. 
the  endowment  to  spiritual  personality,  or  to  the  unity  and 
freedom  of  the  self  over  against  the  world,  and  also  the  con- 
sequent question  as  to  the  meaning  and  performance  of  the 
whole  cosmic  process.1     With  the  teleological  thought  of  en- 
dowment, however,  the  limits  of  setiological  explanation  are 
indicated.2 

Notes  to  §11:2 

1.  The  traditional  is  not  the  original.     Spontaneity  is  the  original. 

2.  There  can  be  causal  explanation  of  the  passive,  the  acquired; 
but  what  does  the  acquiring  cannot  be  so  explained. 

3.  The  question  as  to  the  origin  of  religion  "  in  humanity  " 
leads  first  of  all  into  historical  investigation  as  to  the  original 
form  of  religion.     But  this  investigation,   like  all   investiga- 
tion into  the  first  beginnings  of  life,  loses  itself  in  the  obscurity 
of  pre-historical  existence.1     All  that  remains,  therefore,  un- 
less one  foregoes  all  effort  at  scientific  explanation,  is  the  pos- 
sibility of  a  psychological  hypothesis  which  seeks  to  make  the 
genesis  of  religion  understandable  on  the  basis  of  the  general 
psychological  endowment  and  external  situation  of  man. 

Note  to  §11 : 3 

1.  The  animal  kingdom  has  a  kind  of  history;  values  are  acquired 
in  animal  life.  As  far  as  we  can  go  in  our  investigations,  all  is 
most  reassuring  to  one  who  believes  in  the  originality  and  the 
structuralness  of  the  good  in  reality.  Would  it  not  be  a  more  ade- 
quate God-faith  to  hold  that  reality  is  originally  and  structurally 
good  throughout,  even  if  we  had  to  give  up  the  questions  as  to  per- 
sonality, trinity  in  unity,  etc.,  than  to  hold  to  the  old  doctrine  of 
an  absentee  good  Being,  with  a  cosmos  which  was  not  originally  or 
structurally  good  ?  Is  this  what  people  mean  when  they  say  that  the 
God-idea  is  passing  away? 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     27 

4.  The  psychological  hypotheses  concerning  the  genesis  of 
religion  move  in  different  directions,  ever  according  to  the 
conception  and  meaning  of  religion  (cf.  §10).  The  hypothesis 
most  approximate  to  the  view  set  forth  above  may  now  be 
given.  The  origin  of  religion  is  to  be  explained  as  follows: 
(a)  On  the  one  hand  it  is  to  be  explained  from  the  problem 
of  the  happiness  of  man  over  against  the  world  (v.  §7),  a 
problem  in  which  the  tendency  to  the  unity  and  freedom  of  the 
self  comes  to  elementary  expression,  (b)  On  the  other  hand 
at  the  same  time,  the  origin  of  religion  is  to  be  explained  from 
the  immediate  impression  of  certain  natural  phenomena  upon 
men,  the  impression  that  a  power  announces  itself  in  these 
phenomena,  a  power  which  claims  man  and  is  or  may  be  made 
mindful  of  his  happiness  and  well-being.  This  is  what  Schroe- 
der  would  call  the  nature- worship  root  of  religion,  (c)  The 
ancestor-worship  root  is  the  soul-cult  theory  set  forth  by  Schroe- 
der.  (d)  Finally,  according  to  Lang  and  Schroeder,  by  the 
side  of  the  egoistic  root  mentioned  above  there  is  equally  orig- 
inal and  structural  the  altruistic  root.  This  last  is  the  source 
of  the  moralization  of  religion  and  accounts  for  the  indissolubil- 
ity  throughout  of  religion  and  morality.  But  as  yet  hy- 
potheses remain  indefinite  and  uncertain  in  details,  on  account 
of  our  ignorance  of  the  state  of  primitive  man.  Moreover, 
all  hypotheses  lead  to  an  original  endowment  in  man,  and  thus 
to  the  limits  of  aetiological  explanation. 

5.  //  the  truth  of  religion  is  acknowledged,  then  the  pre- 
supposition underlying  the  human  inner  life  must  be  viewed 
as  (a)  a  divine  endowment,  while  that  from  without  which 
awakens  this  impression  must  come  under  the  point  of  view 
of  (b)  a  divine  disclosure.  The  religious  knowledge  thus 
gained  must  be  viewed  as  (c)  divine  self-disclosure  to  man 
by  means  of  those  disclosures.  But  these  thoughts  lead  beyond 
the  pale  of  religio-psychological  and  religio-historical  consid- 
eration.1 

Note  to  §11 :  5 

1.  The  truth  of  religion  is  wrapped  up  with  the  question  regarding 
the  revelation-idea  of  religion.  Religiosity  is  psychological  and  in- 
dubitable. But  the  revelation-idea  is  a  presupposition  to  account  for 
this  religiosity  from  the  standpoint  of  religion.  But  this  is  not  a 


28      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

psychological  or  historical,  but  a  metaphysical  question.  Is  religion 
true?  Psychology  cannot  say.  Dogmatics  cannot  escape  philosophy, 
the  Ritschlians  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 

c.  THE  PECULIARITY  OF  CHRISTIANITY  AS  AGAINST  OTHEE 
RELIGIONS. 

§12.  The  Gradation  of  Religion  (Stages  of  Religious  Develop- 
ment). 

1.  In  spite  of  our  setting  out  from  Christianity  in  our  analy- 
sis of  the  religious  life,  we  have  drawn  in  the  other  historical 
formations  of  religion  by  way  of  comparison.     They  are  to  be 
distinguished  from  Christianity  and  from  one  another;  and 
yet  never  by  mere  single  externals,  but  by  the  individual  stamp 
or  mold  of  all  the  features  of  the  religious  life  (v.  §6).     The 
individuality  of  a  religion  has  its  root  (a)  in  the  revelation- 
basis  which  gives  norm  to  that  religion  (v.  §7:2),  or  (b)  in 
the  hoped  for  or  enjoyed  redemptive  good  (§7:  1). 

2.  Effort  has  been  made  to  gain  a  survey  at  least  of  the  in- 
exhaustible  manifokliiess   of   religions,    by   classification   into 
groups.     This    classification    has    unconsciously    assumed    the 
character  of  a  gradation,  of  stages  of  worth  or  development. 
These  classifications  have  been  very  variously  constructed,  al- 
ways in  accordance  with  the  main  point  of  view.     Also  they 
aid  in  very  diverse  degree  in  an  inner  understanding  of  the 
distinctions  important  for  the  life  of  religion. 

3.  If  we  set  out  from  the  revelations  of  the  various  reli- 
gions in  their  correlation  to  the  happiness  striven  for,  we  get 
the  following  fundamental   order  or  arrangement:     (a)  Na- 
ture religions,  which  hold  to  disclosures  of  divine  powers  in 
striking  natural  phenomena  and  orders,  especially  in  beneficent 
and  injurious  natural  phenomena.     The  lowest  stage.s  of  na- 
ture religion  are  fetichism  and  animism.     The  highest  stages 
pass  in  fluid  transition  over  into  (b)  folk  religions,  or  ethicized 
or  humanized  nature  religions,  in  which  divine  disclosures  are 
found  not  only  in  the  region  of  nature,  but  above  all  in  the 
region  of  the  folk-life,  with  its  processes  and  orders.     To  this 
(polytheistic)   double  group,  a  second  double  group   (exalted 
above  polytheism)    fastens  on,  viz.    (c)    law  religions,  which 
(o)   find  the  regulative  revelation  of  God  in  the  communica- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     29 

tion  of  a  unitary  law  of  life  and  (ft)  expect  retribution  for 
man  according  to  the  measure  in  which  he  fulfils  the  law; 
and  (b)  redemption  religions,  which  believe  in  a  redeeming 
disclosure  of  deity,  viz.  (a)  mystical  redemption  religion,  (/?) 
pessimistic  redemption  religion  (Buddhism,  which,  in  its  orig- 
inal form,  some  think  is  not  real  religion  at  all),  and  (y) 
Christian  redemption  religion,  which  is  of  a  positive,  ethical 
and  historical  character. 

§13.  Comparative  Characteristics  of  Christianity. 

1.  Christianity  is  historical  redemption  religion  par  excel- 
lence, in  so  far  as  it  has  its  center  in  faith  in  Jesus  as  the 
Christ,  and  therewith  as  redemptive  revealer  of  God  (v.  §3). 
Now  other  religions  also  condition  connection  with  their  reli- 
gious communities  upon  recognition  of  their  historical  found- 
ers.    This  is  especially  the  case  with  the  two  world-religions 
associated  with  Mohammed  and  Buddha.     But  there  is  a  dis- 
tinction between  Christianity  and  them  in  this  matter,     (a) 
Christianity  by  virtue  of  its  inner  character  acknowledges  Jesus 
Christ  not  only  as  prophet  and  supreme  model,  but  as  redeem- 
ing Savior  and  Lord,  and  as  abiding  ground  and  immediate 
object  of  personal  faith  (cf.  §3).     (b)   Another  distinction  is 
the  kind  and  content  of  the  salvation  expected  from  Jesus 
Christ. 

2.  Ethical  redemption  religion   (cf.    §9:4) — this  is  what 
Christianity  is  by  virtue  of  its  law  of  life  and  its  redemptive 
good,     (a)   The  law  religions  are  also  expressed  in  a  unitary 
law  of  life  (§12:  3,  c),  but  the  new  law  of  life  arising  from 
Jesus  has,  as  compared  with  them,    (a)    a  different  content, 
i.  e.  a  spiritual,  moral  content   (cf.   §  4:2,  b)  ;   (/?)   another 
kind  of  validity  —  i.  e.   it  is  valid  on  account  of  its   inner 
worth;  and  (y)  another  position  in  the  whole  of  religion,  espe- 
cially in  relation  to  the  redemptive  good  (cf.  §4 :  2,  c)  —  i.  e. 
the  law  in  law  religion  is  the  cause  of  its  redemptive  good ;  in 
Christianity  it  is  its  effect,     (b)   The  redemptive  good  itself, 
in  distinction  from  (a)  the  good  striven  for  in  nature  religion 
and  folk  religion,  also  from  (/?)  the  reward  expected  in  law 
religions,  is  of  a  purely  ethical  kind,  and  it  is  this  fact  that 
distinguishes  Christianity  from  the  other  redemption  religions. 


30      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

The  latter  redeem  man  to  (a)  absorption  of  the  soul  in  God, 
or  to  (/?)  self-liberation  from  a  painful  existence.1  But  re- 
demption in  Christianity  signifies  the  uplift  of  spiritual  per- 
sonality from  sin  and  guilt  to  filial  communion  with  the  perfect 
God  and  with  all  the  children  of  God  (cf.  §4:  2,  a). 

Note  to  §13 : 2 

1.  The  ontological,  pantheistic  religions  end  with  man's  absorption 
in  God,  with  the  dissipation  of  his  personality  and  individuality. 
He  may  enrich  the  life  of  the  Absolute,  as  dead  leaves  falling  to 
the  ground  enrich  the  life  of  the  tree.  He  becomes  a  fertilizer  of 
the  Absolute. 

In  the  newer  idea,  the  re-inclusion  of  man  in  God  is  left  out  of 
account,  and  the  race  is  put  in  place  of  God.  The  personal  life  ceases, 
it  is  held,  but  it  enriches  the  life  of  the  race.  At  death  there  will 
take  place  my  absorption  in  the  race  for  the  fertilization  of  the  race. 

Pantheism  and  the  older  theism  are  both  overcome;  panentheism  is 
now  more  nearly  the  word  we  should  use. 

Christianity  is  not  so  much  concerned  with  redemption  from  pain, 
as  it  is  to  make  pain  auxiliary  to  the  development  of  moral  per- 
sonality. 

3.  Also  the  Christian  view  of  God  as  heavenly  Father 
(§4:3),  or  as  redemptive  and  pedagogic  holy  love,  compared 
with  the  view  of  God  of  other  -eligions  confirms  the  charac- 
teristic of  Christianity  as  historical  and  positive  ethical  re- 
demption religion,  or  as  religion  of  the  Gospel.1 

Note  to  §13 : 3 

1.  The  new  religio-historical  movement  in  Germany,  represented  by 
Troeltsch,  Bousset,  Wernle,  J.  Weiss,  and  Weinel,  is  the  culmina- 
tion of  what  has  been  going  on  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years.  It 
accepts  the  absolute  relativity  of  all  historical  life,  and  hence  of 
Jesus.  It  eliminates  the  idea  of  the  isolatedness  and  singularity  of 
Christianity  and  puts  it  into  genetic  connection  with  the  develop- 
ment of  the  historical  religious  life,  and  relativizes  it.  It  accepts 
seriously  the  hypothesis  of  universal  evolution.  It  tends  to  hold 
that  the  distinction  between  God  and  the  world  is  an  abstraction  of 
importance,  but  only  an  abstraction,  a  distinction  comparable  to  the 
distinction  between  volition  and  act,  or  between  inside  and  outside. 
But  the  men  of  this  school  confess  Jesus  as  a  creative  revelation- 
personality,  and  are  enthusiastic  in  their  devotion  to  him  as  Savior 
and  Lord  (cf .  G.  B.  Foster :  "  Some  Modern  Estimates  of  Jesus," 
American  Journal  of  Theology,  Vol.  IX,  1905,  pp.  333  ff.). 

Weinel  says,  "  After  Jesus,  it  is  his  religion,  or  none."  But  is 
it  Jesus'  religion,  or  is  it  our  religion  with  faith  in  Jesus  t 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHHISTIAN  DOGMATICS     31 

§14.  The  Essential  and  Permanent  in  Christianity. 

We  may  now  gather  up  at  the  close  of  this  main  division 
(A)  the  salient  features  which  confront  us  in  (a)  the  histor- 
ical phenomena  of  Christianity  (§§3  and  4),  and  in  (b)  the 
comparison  of  Christianity  with  other  religions  (§§12  and  13). 

1.  As  to  objective  content,  Christianity  may  be  defined  as  the 
gospel  of  the  love  of  God  the  heavenly  Father,  who  redeems 
us  and  educates  us  for  his  kingdom,  this  love  being  revealed 
in  Jesus  Christ.1  Subjectively  considered,  the  Christian  life 
consists  in  our  trustful  surrender  to  Jesus  Christ,2  by  means 
of  which  we  win  (a)  filial  communion  with  God,  and  (b) 
sanctification  in  discipline  and  love.8  By  means  of  these 
(communion  and  sanctification)  we  gain  (c)  eternal  life,  be- 
ginning here  already  and  awaiting  consummation  hereafter.4 

Notes  to  §14 : 1 

1.  Must   Christianity  be  considered*  as  the   absolute   religion,   or 
may  it  be  superseded?     Not  all  of  the  content  of  Christianity  has 
yet  been  externalized.     The  adjective  "  Christian "  will  best  char- 
acterize the  human   ideal   forever.     Tertullian   was   right :     "  Mens 
humana  naturaliter  Christiana."     The  more  one  develops  along  the 
lines  of  inherent  manliness  the  more  he  will  come  to  be  like  Christ 
in  his  disposition.     To   be  truly  human   will   ultimately  be   to  be 
Christian.     To  Christianize  is  not  to  dehumanize  humanity,  but  to 
humanize  humanity. 

2.  In  substituting  Jesus'  person  for  his  cause   [the  gospel  about 
Jesus  for  the  gospel  of  Jesus],  has  Christianity  gone  astray  from 
its  birth?     The  essential  thing  in  the  Christian  faith  in  Jesus  is  that 
God  is  as  good  as  Jesus  is,  even  though  appearances  may  sometimes 
be  to  the  contrary.     If  we  can  stick  to  this  in  all  the  grind  and 
torture  and  darkness  of  this  world,  we  can  live  in  hope  and  die 
without  despair.     If  the  will  at  the  ieart  of  things  is,  in  its  attitude 
toward  us,  as  good  as  the  will  of  Jesus,  I  can  bury  my  child,  I  can 
pass  through  invalidism,  lose  my  fortune,  be  maligned,  and  die  for- 
gotten before  I  die;  I  can  assume  too  that  the  divine  attitude  toward 
me  in  my  guilt  will  be  one  of  mercy.     If  God  is  truly  represented 
by  the  will  of  Jesus,  made  omnipotent,  what  need  I  fear?     If  we 
depart  from  this,  we  depart  from  the  Christian  religion.     As  people 
decline  to  believe  this,  they  decline,   theoretically  and  practically, 
from  Christianity. 

3.  The  doctrine  of  sanctification  illustrates  the  interpenetration  of 
religion  and  morality  in  Christianity.     In  Christianity  there  is  no 
relation  to  man  which  is  not  a  relation  to  God,  and  no  relation  to 
God  which  is  not  a  relation  to  man. 


32      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

4.  See,  in  this  connection,  Lessing's  "  Education  of  the  Human 
Race" — an  old  rationalistic  book,  but  one  which  might  have  been 
written  yesterday  —  and  Lessing's  "  The  Demonstration  of  the  Spirit 
and  of  Power." 

2.  All  these  features  point  to  the  essential  and  permanent 
content  of  Christianity  and  the  Christian  life,  (a)  But  the 
gospel  had  to  be  preached  by  Jesus  himself  in  .the  use  of  the 
ideas  and  forms  of  expression  of  his  time.1  (b)  Also  the 
Christian  life  was  lived  by  the  disciples  of  Jesus  in  the  defi- 
nite relations  and  tasks  under  which  they  stood.2  Thus  the 
gospel  and  the  Christian  life  have  formed  manifold  individual 
formations  under  changing  times  and  circumstances.  But,  for 
all  that,  in  the  points  specified  above,  the  changing  forms  can 
preserve  an  inner  unity  and  continuity  with  the  original  gos- 
pel. In  the  degree  that  these  changing  forms  bring  those 
characteristic  features  to  distinct  individual  expression  and 
organization  are  they  really  Christian.3 

Notes  to  §14 : 2 

1.  The  difficulty  in  adapting  the  gospel  to  the  modern  world-view 
lies  in  the  fact  that  it  was  at  first  preached  lashed  close  home  to  the 
dualistic  conception.     This  is  reflected  in  such  expressions  as  "  Your 
Father  in  heaven."     God  is  in  the  rosebud  and  in  the  soul  of  the 
little  child  as  well  as  in  heaven.     Besides,  "  heaven  "  has  not  the  same 
significance  now  as  it  had  then. 

2.  In  our  generically  different  world-view  and  tasks,  we  cannot 
copy  primitive  Christianity,  theoretically  and  practically,  and  this 
gets  us  into  trouble  with  orthodoxy.     Monism  is  not  dualism.     Im- 
manent values  of  present  human  life  are  in  conflict  with  transcendent 
eschatology,  and  that  is  the  end  of  that  matter  too. 

3.  There  are  churches  to  whom  we  send  missionaries.     They  are 
very  different  from  us,  but  are  we  sure  that  they  are  not  Christian? 
They  may  worship  images,  appropriate  the  perpetual  body  of  Christ 
through  their  physical  organisms  in  the  mass,  believe  in  evil  spirits 
and  witches,  and  in  a  literal  resurrection  of  the  physical  body  — 
hair,  teeth,  stomach  and  all  —  but  if  they  trust  the  love  of  God  in 
Jesus  Christ,  commune  with  God  and  thereby  grow  in  a  holy  life, 
which  is  eternal  life  here  and  hereafter,  they  are  Christians,  and  all 
these  other  things  are  not  such  as  necessarily  keep  them  from  being 
Christians.     We  are  introducing  the  Western  civilization  to  certain 
churches  of  the  Near  East  under  the  guise  of  missions;  it  is  an 
optical  illusion,  which  has  its  advantages.     The  one  thing,  the  lack 
of  which  in  their  Christianity  is  most  serious  of  all,  is  the  idea  of 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     33 

the  capacity  of  development  in  Christianity,  and  to  get  that  idea 
into  them,  you  must  get  them  to  develop. 

Now  let  us  turn  to  the  other  extreme.  May  one  trust  the  love  of 
God  in  connection  with  the  idea  that  man  is  a  unity,  that  the  dis- 
tinction between  altruism  arid  egoism  is  not  absolute,  that  the  dis- 
tinction between  God  and  the  world  is  an  abstraction,  that  person- 
ality as  we  know  it  is  inadequate  as  an  expression  of  God,  that  a 
more  adequate  expression  is  the  moral  order  of  the  world?  Here 
the  problem  is  more  serious.  Do  the  gospel  and  the  modern  view 
of  the  world  (with  its  monism,  its  divine  immanency,  its  dynamic  and 
energic  becoming)  inwardly  belong  together?  It  is  hard  to  make 
this  go,  but  I  believe  it  can  be  done. 

3.  Thus  understood,  Christianity,  in  distinction  from  the 
rigidity  of  law  religions  and  from  the  unhistoricalness  of  the 
other  redemption  religions,  is  a  religion  of  the  spirit,  which, 
along  with  the  permanent  features  it  contains,  enters  into  liv- 
ing history,  i.  e.  it  itself  enters  into  a  process  of  development.1 
Precisely  in  this  capacity  for  development  by  which  Chris- 
tianity is  distinguished  from  other  religions  do  we  find  the 
basis  (a)  for  its  missionary  claims  more  consciously  and  more 
consistently  than  can  be  made  by  any  other  religion,  and  (b) 
for  its  claim  to  be  the  ultimate  religion,  and  to  proclaim  uni- 
versally valid,  permanent  truth. 

Note  to  §14:  3 

1.  Christianity  is  a  religion  of  the  spirit.  Law  religion  is,  in 
the  nature  of  things,  historyless,  static.  Even  other  redemption  re- 
ligions are,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  historyless.  They  have  a  static  meta- 
physics. Christianity  is  distinctively  historical,  a  religion  of  the 
spirit,  and  it  belongs  to  the  nature  of  spirit  to  externalize  itself,  to 
enter  into  process  and  development. 

B.    THE  TRUTH  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION1 

a.  THE  EFFORT  TO  PROVIDE  A  THEORETICAL  PROOF  OF  THE 
TRUTH  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  FAITH.2 

§15.  The  Stimulus  to  Attempts  at  Theoretical  Proof. 

1.  If  the  claim  of  Christianity  to  be  universally  valid  truth 
is  to  be  justified  it  would  seem  best  at  first  sight  to  take  the 
same  path  which  leads  to  the  fixation  of  otherwise  universally 
valid  truths,  viz.  the  path  of  a  scientific  proof  wherein  the 


34     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

necessitation  of  perception  and  of  thought  would  be  the  decisive 
criterion. 

Notes  to  B 

1.  As  in  Part  A  dogmatics  gives  a  resume  of  the  psychological,  his- 
torical and  philosophical  study  of  religion,  so  in  Part  B  it  gives  a 
resume  of  the  apologetic  vindication  of  the  right  of  the  Christian 
religion  to  a  permanent  function  in  the  development  of  the  spiritual 
life  of  man. 

2.  Apologetics  is  in  a  state  of  flux  to-day,  and  I  hesitate  to  do 
anything  with  it  any  more,  and  reserve  the  right  to  change  all  this 
if  I  have  to  do  so.     But  I  am  still  inclined  to  think  that,  much  as 
our  thinking  is  being  colored  by  pragmatism  and  the  activity-philo- 
sophy, the  main  contention  of  our  apologetics  abides. 

2.  Mediaeval  scholasticism  has  made  this  effort  within  the 
history  of  Christianity  in  a  certain  scope;   so  did  scholastic 
orthodoxy,  but  in  more  definite  limits.     This  attempt  has  been 
repeated   in  manifold   forms   in   rationalism    and    in   various 
branches  of  modern  philosophy  and  of  modern  theology. 

3.  The  other  side  of  the  shield,  that  is,  the  obverse  side  of 
this  attempt  to  make  the  world  of  faith   of  Christianity,  or  a 
part  of  it,  directly  accessible  to  a  theoretical  proof,  is,  how- 
ever, the  danger  that  science  and  faith  fall  into  hostile  camps. 
Since  this  contradiction  can  be  legitimized  only  temporarily 
by  the  thought  of  a  "  two-fold  truth,"  the  further  danger  arises 
of  violent  efforts  at  unification,   whether  these  efforts  be  by 
(a)    a   hierarchical   subjection   of  science  under  the  yoke   of 
"  faith,"  or  (b)  a  rational  reduction  of  faith  to  the  universal 
truths  of  reason. 

4.  But  our  question  is  not  merely  concerning  these  dangers, 
but  concerning  the  possibility  of  a  theoretical  proof  of  the 
objects  of  faith,  or  of  a  part  of  them. 

§16.  The  Insufficiency  of  the  Traditional  Theistic  Arguments. 

1.  Efforts  at  a  theoretical  proof  of  the  fundamental  idea  of 
the  Christian  faith,  have  been  concentrated  upon  the  so-called 
proofs  of  the  existence  of  God.  The  traditional  forms  of  these 
proofs  are  (a)  ontological,  (b)  cosmological,  (c)  teleological, 
(d)  psychological,  (e)  historical.  These  persist  still,  even  in 
the  present,  though  in  developed  form.  Even  where  new 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHEISTIAN  DOGMATICS      35 

proofs  are  attempted  they  share  with  the  last  four  mentioned 
the  method  of  regress  from  a  given  state  of  fact  to  its  meta- 
physical presuppositions. 

2.  None  of  these  proofs  has  power  to  compel  the  assent  of 
the  intellect.  They  lack  the  necessitation  of  perception  and 
of  thought  (a)  partly  in  their  starting-point,  (b)  partly  in  the 
progress  from  this  starting  point.  What  survives  in  these 
proofs  is  (a)  in  part  postulates  of  thought,  (b)  in  greater  part 
postulates  and  expressions  of  the  worth-perceiving  heart. 
These  postulates  are  of  great  preliminary  importance  for  the 
Christian  faith,  but  in  themselves  they  are  still  too  indefinite 
and  general  to  be  able  to  lead  us  to  the  Christian  God-idea  in 
its  determinateness. 

§17.  The  Comprehensive  Reason  for  the  Collapse  of  All  the 
Attempts  at  Theoretical  Proof  of  the  Existence  of  the 
God  of  Christian  Faith. 

1.  The  insufficiency  of  all  theoretical  proofs  flows  on  the 
one  side  from  the  essence  of  the  religious,  and  especially  of 
the  Christian  faith  in  God.     The  Christian  God-idea  has  for 
its  essential  content  (§4:3  and  §13:  3)  the  idea  of  a  holy  and 
gracious  God,  who  will  redeem  and  educate  us  for  blessedness 
in  his  kingdom.     The  reality  of  such  a  God  and  of  his  do- 
minion in  the  world  can, never  be  reached  by  a  syllogism  of 
the  understanding,  but  can  be  apprehended  in  the  heart's  recep- 
tivity for  redeeming  and  pedagogic  love  (cf.  §8). 

2.  On  the  other  side  the  collapse  of  all  efforts  at  proof  is 
grounded  in  the  character  and  limits  of  theoretical  cognition. 
(a)   Theoretical  knowledge,  according  to  its  character,  appre- 
hends the  given  material  of  perception  in  the  forms  of  space 
and  time,  and  as  a  manifold  of  causally  successive  interacting 
things  and  processes.     It  orders  the  world  just  apprehended  as 
comprehensively  as  possible  into  (a)  a  system  of  concepts  and 
laws,  but  also  into  (£)  an  intelligible  system  of  development, 
especially  in  the  region  of  animated  nature  and  of  mental  life. 
This  ordering  is  accomplished  by  the  aid  of  hypotheses,  which 
widen  and  refine  the  net  of  conditions,     (b)   Now  in  doing 
this  work  we  hit  upon  the  limits  of  knowledge,  which  cannot 


36     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

be  transcended.  As  an  absolutely  given  presupposition  of 
knowledge  there  is  on  the  one  hand  (a)  the  stuff  of  sensation 
streaming  to  us,  and  on  the  other  hand  (ft)  our  own  cognitive 
consciousness,  with  its  necessary  cognitive  forms  and  ideals. 
Over  against  these  two  limiting  points,  all  that  is  possible  is 
only  the  cognitive  postulate,  viz.  that  the  given  stuff  of  sensa- 
tions will  be  adapted  to  our  cognitive  consciousness,  in  that 
it  will  admit  of  being  ordered  by  the  latter  into  a  unitary  sys- 
tem of  knowledge.  But  it  is  impossible  to  press  on  by  way 
of  logically  necessary  steps  to  a  knowledge  of  the  content  of 
the  ultimate  ground  both  of  the  world  and  of  our  conscious- 
ness. Now  the  proofs  of  the  existence  of  God,  at  least  on 
their  theoretical  side,  are  only  vain  attempts  to  transcend  the 
limits  herewith  specified.1 

Note  to  §17:  2 

1.  After  orthodoxy  gained,  by  these  proofs,  the  existence  of  God, 
its  further  procedure  was  as  follows:  (1)  God  is  above  and  outside 
of  man.  God  is  in  heaven;  man,  on  earth.  These  stand  not  only 
for  different  localities,  but  for  different  values.  (2)  God  is  holy  and 
merciful,  but  man  on  the  earth  is  ruined  and  empty  of  holiness. 
(3)  The  relation  between  God  and  man  must  of  necessity  be  one  of 
communication,  or  of  revelation  from  God  to  man,  from  heaven  to 
earth.  (4)  How  is  this  communication  or  revelation  to  be  known  by 
man,  dissociated  from  God,  to  be  revelation?  Only  by  outer  ob- 
jective signs.  That  is,  revelation  must  announce  its  origin  from 
Absolute  Intelligence  by  predictions,  and  from  Aboslute  Power  by 
miracle.  Prediction  and  miracle  are  the  signs  that  it  is  revelation 
from  God.  (5)  In  order  to  the  perpetuity  of  this  revelation,  com- 
municated in  definite  time  and  space,  to  the  subsequent  world,  the 
revelation  must  be  embodied  in  Sacred  Scripture.  But  how  is  the 
Scripture  to  be  guaranteed  to  be  revelation?  To  this  end  the  Scrip- 
tures must  be  inspired  by  the  Author  of  the  revelation.  (6)  So  far 
the  whole  process  is  by  God  himself,  all  on  the  object-side  —  all  this 
that  is  to  make  revelation  certain  and  accessible  to  man;  the  media- 
tion to  the  subject  is  still  wanting,  and  this  is  most  important. 
(7)  The  subject  appropriates  the  revelation  by  the  interpretation  of 
the  Scriptures;  but  how  will  the  subject  detect  that  the  supposed 
revelation  is  really  divine?  The  answer  is,  By  the  miracle  and 
prediction  accompanying  the  original  communication  of  the  revela- 
tion. Very  well,  but  how  detect  that  these  are  real  miracles  and 
predictions?  The  answer  is,  By  the  witness  of  the  Scriptures.  Very 
well  again,  but  how  detect  again  that  the  witness  of  the  Scriptures 
is  true?  The  answer  is  that  the  Scriptures  are  inspired  by  a  truthful 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHEISTIAN  DOGMATICS      37 

God.  Good  again,  but  how  detect  the  inspiration  as  divine?  The 
answer  is,  By  the  inner  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  who,  as  we  read 
in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  recognizes  his  own  work  therein.  Good 
again,  but  how  shall  we  be  certain  that  this  really  originates  from 
the  Holy  Spirit,  and  not  from  our  own  spirit?  (8)  Here  the  thread 
of  the  orthodox  system  snaps.  In  place  of  the  divine  witness  for 
revelation  we  now  put  human  proofs,  arguments  from  the  genuine- 
ness and  trustworthiness  of  the  Biblical  writings  to  the  truth  of 
that  which  they  narrate  of  revelations  of  God,  and  from  the  divine 
worthiness  of  the  content  of  Scriptures  to  their  divine  origin.  But 
many  human  doubts  correspond  to  these  human  proofs.  The  gen- 
uineness and  trustworthiness  of  the  Scriptures  have  been  assailed. 
Possibilities  of  deception  or  of  self-deception,  and  of  the  obscura- 
tion of  historical  truth  by  legendary  narratives  and  mythical  forma- 
tions, have  irresistibly  suggested  themselves.  The  Bible  appears  as 
an  aggregate  of  writings  of  very  unequal  merits.  At  times  there 
was  no  fulfilment  to  the  prediction ;  at  other  times,  no  prediction  to 
the  fulfilment.  Miracle  is  dissolved  by  mythical  explanations.  In 
the  revelation  man  recognizes  his  own  laws  —  laws,  if  not  of  his 
reason,  of  his  feeling  and  imagination. 

The  above  is  the  critical  self-dissolution  of  the  dualistic  view  of 
the  world,  and  of  all  the  efforts  to  patch  it  up.  Some,  e.  g.,  E.  Zeller, 
have  said  that  with  dualism  goes  the  Christian  religion.  Strauss 
tried  to  affiliate  the  Christian  religion  with  a  monistic  view  of  the 
world,  but  failed,  and  came  out  into  materialism  and  sestheticism. 
Baur,  Pfleiderer  and  the  Cairds  make  the  same  attempt,  and  remain 
Christian.  Others  say,  We  cannot  do  anything  with  the  problem, 
and  so  we  will  be  anti-metaphysical  philosophers.  Kaftan  exempli- 
fies this  position;  he  has  to  employ  metaphysics  to  quite  an  extent 
in  order  to  get  rid  of  metaphysics.  He  has  never  criticized  his  con- 
cept of  "  revelation."  But,  in  any  case,  dualistic  supernaturalism 
has  been  retired.  But  what  are  we  to  have  in  place  of  it  —  monism 
or  pluralism?  I  am  sure  as  to  negations,  not  as  to  affirmations. 

3.  This  critical  limitation  of  theoretical  knowledge  has,  how- 
ever, a  great  indirect  worth  for  the  proof  of  the  truth  of  the 
Christian  faith,  (a)  It  may  be  turned  critically  against  the 
tendencies  of  a  dogmatic  metaphysics  which  is  hostile  to  Chris- 
tianity, against  materialistic  monism,  (b)  It  shows  that  on 
the  side  of  theoretical  knowledge  the  region  remains  free  in 
which  Christian  faith  moves,  (a)  Along  with  the  knowledge 
of  the  single  phenomena  of  the  world  there  is,  as  equally  essen- 
tial for  man,  the  apprehension  of  worth  in  various  value-judg- 
ments (v.  §8).  (£)  Along  with  the  effort  after  a  cognitive 
system  of  the  world,  there  is  the  question  as  to  a  unitary  mean- 


38     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ing  of  the  world,  (y)  Along  with  the  aetiological  explanation, 
there  is  the  teleological  understanding  of  the  world  and  its  last 
End  and  Ground. 

4.  By  means  of  this  distinction,  in  connection  with  our  ques- 
tion as  to  the  truth  of  the  Christian  faith,  we  are  led  over 
from  the  attempts  at  theoretical  proofs  to  the  attempts  at  a 
substantiation  that  is  practically  direct. 

b.  PRACTICAL  SUBSTANTIATION  OF  THE  TRUTH  OF  THE 
CHRISTIAN  FAITH. 

§18.  The  Two  Main  Points  of  Practical  Proof,  and  the  Mod- 
ern Views  of  the  World   Which  Confront  Christianity. 

1.  In  the  practical  proof  only  those  reasons  are  to  be  sys- 
tematically apprehended  to  which  the  Christian  proclamation 
itself  appeals,  and  on  which  the  plain  Christian  reflects  in  his 
religious  life,  when   he   assures  himself  of  the   truth  of  his 
faith  against  his  doubts.     These  reasons  lie  (a)  in  reminding 
ourselves  of  what  we  have  in  our  faith  for  our  innermost  life, 
and  (b)  in  reminding  ourselves  of  the  evidences,  or  disclosures, 
in  which  the  power  of  a  holy,  redeeming  and  pedagogic  love 
confronts  us  as  reality  in  a  manner  that  convinces  the  heart. 

2.  In  these  two  points  (a  and  b  above)  Christianity  has  to 
compare  itself  with  other  modern  views  of  the  world  which 
rest  on  a  different  interpretation  of  the  world  and  of  our  des- 
tiny in  it;  especially  (a)   with  aesthetic,  or  naturalistic  pan- 
theism, (b)  with  pessimism,  into  which  a  naturalistic  or  ma- 
terialistic world-view  consistently  lands  us.     Also  (c)   scepti- 
cism, or  agnosticism,  fluctuates  between  these  two  views  of  the 
world  (a  and  b  just  mentioned). 

3.  In  the  conflict  of  Christianity  with  these  three  world- 
views,  it  is  not  faith  against  science,  but  faith  against  faith.1 
The  question  is,  (a)  Which  faith  is  the  one  that  corresponds 
best  to  the  essential  needs  of  man  and  of  humanity  ?     Which 
faith   functions   most   serviceably  in   the  development  of  the 
spiritual  life  of  man  and  of  the  race?     (b)  What  faith  can 
claim  for  its  support  the  inwardly  convincing  disclosures  of  the 
world  in  which  we  live?     That  is,  do  the  facts,  manifestations 
of  the  world  in  which  we  live,  comport  better  with  naturalism, 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     39 

pessimism,  or  agnosticism  on  the  one  hand,  or  with  the  Chris- 
tian conviction  on  the  other?  In  which  direction  does  our 
inward  conviction  point?  (On  the  basis  of  our  inward  con- 
viction, considering  wide  reaches  of  time  and  space,  can  we  be 
pessimists  ?  Does  the  trend  of  things  require  pessimism  ?) 

Note  to  §18 :  3 

1.  If  the  Christian  religion  is  a  sum  of  propositions,  then  it  must 
be  propagated  by  proof.  But  if  its  content  is  will  and  personality, 
then  its  propagation  must  be  by  will  and  personality  (cf.  the  re- 
cent article  by  Theodor  Kaftan  on  "  The  Christian  Faith  in  the 
Intellectual  Life  of  the  Present " ;  also  H.  Miinsterberg,  Psychology 
and  Life,  pp.  112,  113). 

§19.  The  Immediately  Experienced  Worth  of  Christian  Faith 
for  the  Individual  and  the  Community. 

1.  What  has  the  single  Christian  in  his  faith,  so  far  as  he 
actually  lives  in  it?  (a)  First,  a  supreme  goal  of  his  en- 
deavor, viz.  that  of  filial  communion  with  the  holy  God,  and 
therewith  true  righteousness  at  the  same  time  (v.  §4:2,  a  and 
b).  Precisely  this  goal,  however,  is  certain  to  him  as  the 
unconditionally  worthful  and  obligating,  especially  in  compari- 
son with  all  other  goods  and  tasks.1  Still  the  latter  often 
result  somehow  in  distraction  and  dissipation,  and  in  servility, 
but  the  Christian's  goal  places  before  him  an  inner  stay  and 
content  of  life  without  drawing  him  away  from  the  world  it- 
self.2 In  this  way  the  Christian  passes  from  distraction  to 
inner  unity,  from  dependence  on  the  world  to  inner  freedom 
from  it,  and  precisely  therein  to  a  truly  spiritual  personal  life, 
to  the  gaining  of  the  ^x^  Hence  the  conviction  that  one  is 
able  to  appeal  to  the  conscience  of  others  by  holding  this  goal 
up  before  them,  (b)  But  the  Christian  is  not  simply  left  to 
his  own  endeavor  after  this  goal,  but  he  lives  on  faith  in  a 
redeeming  and  pedagogic  power  of  God.  Thereby  the  Chris- 
tian wins  free  uplift  above  the  crippling  and  crushing  expe- 
riences which  confront  him  on  the  way  to  the  goal ;  that  is  to 
say,  above  guilt  and  weakness  in  temptation,  above  pain  and 
death.  There  does  not  seem  to  be  a  theoretical  explanation 
for  the  Christian  of  these  four  dark  riddles,  but  there  is  a 
practical  solution,  viz.  through  the  uplifting  certainty  (a)  of 


40     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

the  forgiveness  of  guilt,3  (0)  of  God's  holy  power  shielding  us 
from  temptation,  (y)  of  education  through  pain,  (8)  of  re- 
demption from  death.4  Thus  even  here  the  Christian  in  his 
faith  can  experience  something  of  the  supramundane  eternal 
life  in  communion  with  God.5 

Notes  to  §19 : 1 

1.  The  profoundest  religious  spirits  have  felt  this:    "What  have 
I  in  heaven  but  thee?     And  on  earth  there  is  none  that  I  desire 
beside  thee."     "  Thou  hast  been  our  dwelling  place  in  all  genera- 
tions."    "  Thou,  my  everlasting  portion."     "  The  soul  is  restless  till 
it  rests  in  thee."     Not  the  gifts  of  God  are  God,  but  God  himself  is 
God.     Man's  other  goods  and  tasks  are  not  his  goal,  but  instruments 
to  that  greater  goal.     As  motion  of  nerve  and  muscle  may  be  bearer 
of  the  look  of  love,  that  most  precious  gift  which  one  human  heart 
can  give  another,  so  the  whole  social  nervous  system  should  be  ex- 
pression and  bearer  of  higher  values. 

2.  According  to  the  old  dualism,  if  you  are  to  have  the  one,  you 
cannot  have  the  other.     According  to  the  newer  insight,  you  can  have 
the  one  (rightly)  only  in  the  other.     "Is  this  vile  world  a  friend  to 
grace,  to  help  me  on  to  God  ? "     When  it  came  to  the  erecting  of 
natural  impulses  into  ethical,  the  older  Christianity  failed.     It  con- 
demned all  dancing,  for  instance;  but,  while  there  may  be  evil  in 
connection  with  it,  proper  dancing  produces  a  distinct  moralization 
and  socialization   of  life.     Not  even  the  saloon-  is  an  unmitigated 
evil;  its  strength,  hold  and  value  are  to  be  found  in  its  function  as  a 
social  rendezvous,  and  this  its  good  point  should  be  utilized  and 
retained. 

The  reason  why  monism  has  not  become  theoretically  clear  is  that 
it  has  not  been  carried  out  practically  in  society.  Practical  monism 
must  precede  theoretical  monism.  The  divine  element  is  present  in 
impulses  and  instincts  and  appetites,  as  well  as  in  goals  and  ideals. 
After  all,  psalm-singing  is  not  an  indispensable  means  in  the  spiritual- 
izing and  ethicizing  of  life;  but  play  is  indispensable.  Segregation 
of  the  natural  impulses  results  in  inner  diremption,  and  tends  toward 
a  life  of  servility  to  these  things.  The  older  Christianity  surrendered 
its  case;  it  virtually  maintained  that  the  suppression  of  natural 
impulse  was  so  good  that  it  was  altogether  too  good  for  man.  But 
the  goal  of  the  Christian,  rightly  appreciated,  gives  him  a  content 
of  life  which  acts  as  a  stay  and  gives  him  balance  in  the  suppression 
of  natural  impulses. 

3.  The  notion  of  the  forgiveness  of  guilt  seems  to  be  dropping 
out  of  preaching.     Why?     Is  it  because  we  do  not  know  what  it 
means?     Is  it  because  of  the  inviolability  of  law  and  the  principle 
of  causation  in  the  moral  as  well  as  in  the  physical  ?     Is  "  forgive- 
ness of  guilt,"  as  applied  to  the  divine,  a  figure  of  speech?     Or  is 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     41 

not  restoration  of  fellowship  and  communion,  together  with  the  con- 
sciousness that  a  sense  of  paralysis  has  gone,  evidence  of  forgive- 
ness? 

4.  The   notion    of    redemption    from   death    has    largely    dropped 
out  of  preaching.     The  attitude  of  most  with-  regard  to  death  is  that 
of  the  ostrich,  which  sticks  its  head  in  the  sand ;  it  is  an  attitude 
of  stoical  waiting,  with  as  little  thought  on  the  matter  as  possible. 
That  is  no  victory  over  death.     Has  not  the  Christian  an  abiding 
victory  over  death;  not  some  mere  antidote  to  chloroform  him  for  a 
while,  but  an  inner  triumph,  making  death  servant  and  minister  to 
his  life?     The  absence  of  problem  to  Jesus  in  these  things  is  the 
remarkable  thing.     The  inner  mastery  of  Jesus,  the  constancy  and 
thoroughness  of  his  inner  triumph  over  pain,  death   and  all  evil, 
makes  him  redemptive  for  us.     The  impression  he  makes  upon  us 
is  redemptive  in  its  effect  (cf.  Kant). 

5.  Eternal  life  is  life  in  enjoyment  of  the  inner  values  of  per- 
sonality. 

2.  Christian  faith  is  worthful  for  human  fellowship.  It  is 
not  merely  mediately  worthful,  as  means  of  promoting  culture 
and  the  fellowship  of  culture.  Rather  the  kingdom  of  God 
with  its  communion  of  religio-ethical  personalities  in  faith  and 
love  proves  itself  immediately  to  be  the  absolutely  worthful 
thing  for  humanity.  Besides,  experience  shows  that  secular 
culture  is  stable  and  beneficent  only  through  this  eternal  con- 
tent and  end;  without  the  latter,  the  former  is  hollow  and 
pernicious.1 

Note  to  §19: 2 

1.  Eternity  is  the  persistence  of  the  worthful  through  the  mutations 
and  illusions  of  the  temporal;  it  is  essentially  continuity  of  values. 
Eternity  is  thus  not  a  gift,  but  an  achievement.  The  eternity  of 
Christ  was  achieved  by  him.  Nothing  ethical  is  obtained  by  the 
sheer  attitude  of  passivity  toward  it.  Eternity  is  not  a  continuation 
of  existence.  All  that  persists  of  the  achievements  of  the  past  is 
the  value  for  which  these  achievement  are  the  raw  material. 

The  notion  of  resurrection  has  no  place  in  this  view,  except  as 
it  is  taken  figuratively.  In  early  Christianity,  until  adjustment 
was  made  to  Greek  ideas,  resurrection  was  a  straightforward  con- 
ception, meaning  resurrection  of  the  body.  The  whole  notion  is 
historically  conditioned;  it  belongs  to  the  old  Judaic  eschatology, 
and  is  not  of  abiding  significance. 

[In  answer  to  a  student's  question  as  to  what  became  of  the  body 
of  Jesus]  I'm  not  on  tap  on  everything! 

I  spent  an  hour  before  a  congregation  once,  marshalling  proofs 


42      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

of  the  bodily  resurrection  of  Jesus.  "Your  sermon  did  not  give 
me  the  uplift  it  usually  does,"  said  a  woman.  "  You  did  not  prove 
your  point,"  said  a  man.  It  was  indeed  a  failure,  both  religiously 
and  scientifically.  Christianity  is  not  a  proposition,  to  be  proved 
by  historical  arguments.  If  it  were,  the  way  to  Christianize  would 
be  not  by  bearing  witness,  but  by  studying  logic.  But  that  would 
be  to  get  off  the  Christian  platform.  My  sermon  was  not  a  Christian 
sermon,  and  it  was  not  of  any  account. 

3.  The  importance  that  personalities  have  for  the  proof  of 
the  truth  of  Christianity  follows  from  1  and  2.  Personalities 
in  their  life  and  in  their  work  for  others  authenticate  the 
worth  of  Christian  faith  for  the  individual  and  for  human 
society. 

§20.  Philosophic  Amplification  of  the  Question  of  Worth. 

1.  If,  according  to  §19:  1,  the  individual  Christian  can  win 
in  Christianity  inner  unity  and  freedom,  and  thereby  the 
character  of  a  spiritual  personality,  philosophy,  or  the  science 
of  the  essential  activities  of  the  human  spirit,  shows  the  fol- 
lowing: (a)  The  effort  for  that  spiritual  personal  life  is 
nothing  accidental  for  man,  but  pervades  all  his  spiritual  ac- 
tivities as  their  unitary,  fundamental  activity.  This  funda- 
mental tendency  attains  a  pronounced  character  in  the  moral 
life,  with  its  acknowledgment  of  an  unconditioned  "  ought.7' 
But  this  tendency  does  not  come  to  its  completion  in  this  moral 
life  alone;  the  moral  life  requires  a  religious  view  of  God  and 
the  world  to  which  man  may  yield  himself.  Indeed  such  a 
view  is  the  stay  of  morality.1  (b)  From  this  point  of  view 
two  considerations  may  be  mentioned :  (a)  All  that  a  moral 
command  ought  to  do  for  a  man  is  done  by  the  Christian  moral 
commandment  in  a  more  perfect  manner,  not  to  be  intensively 
or  extensively  surpassed.  (/?)  A  religious  view  of  God  and 
the  world  which  is  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  perfect  moral 
law  is  proffered  in  Christianity.  (The  elaboration  of  a  and  ft 
is  the  essence  of  the  problem  of  Christian  ethics.)  Therefore, 
according  to  a  and  ft  Christianity  brings  to  completion  the 
tendency  referred  to  under  (a)  above  —  the  tendency  to  a 
true  spiritualization  of  personality,  a  tendency  essential  to 
man,2 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     43 

Notes  to  §20 : 1 

1.  This  is  vital  to  Christianity.     So  far  as  I  can  see,  the  bottom 
falls  out,  if  this  goes.     There  is  much  in  life  which  looks  as  if  it 
were  not  true;  but  closer  examination  will  show  that  it  is  true,  I 
believe. 

Note  the  relation  of  consistent  pessimism  to,  the  moral  life. 

2.  The  tendency  to  ethicization  and  spiritualization  of  personality 
is  structural,  organic  with  man,  and  Christianity  falls  right  in  with 
the  structural  nature  of  man.     Christian  ethics  must  make  much 
of  this. 

The  spiritualization  of  reality  is  the  cosmic  task. 

2.  The  same  thing  is  taught  us  by  the  philosophic  considera- 
tion of  human  society,     (a)   Human  society  is,  as  to  its  basis, 
nature  and  interest  society,  just  as  the  human  individual  is, 
originally  and  fundamentally,  nature  and  interest  individual; 
but  the  society  points  with  inner  necessity,  just  as  in  the  case 
of  the  individual,  to  a  progressive  regulation  (or  moralization) 
and  spiritualization,  which  is  striven  for  also  in  our  human 
cultural  development.     In  this  connection,  therefore,  the  ques- 
tion arises  as  to  a  supreme  unconditioned  norm,  and  a  supreme, 
absolutely  unconditioned  goal  of  development,      (b)  But  since 
progress  in  history  is  not  effectuated  as  nature-process,  but  by 
human  deed,  the  further  question  arises  at  the  same  time  as 
to  the  moral  personal  powers  by  means  of  which  society  can 
be  held  together,  and  development  carried  on  further. 

3.  In  connection  with  the  considerations  amplified  in  1  and 
2,  the  superiority  of  Christianity   (a)   to  other  religions  and 
(b)  to  the  other  views  of  the  world  mentioned  in  §18:  2  may 
be  indicated. 

c.  THE  REVELATION-BASIS  OF  O>UB  CHRISTIAN  FAITH. 

§21.  The  Need  of  Supplementing  the  Value- Judgment  Argu- 
ment. 

1.  The  worth-argument  for  the  Christian  faith  is,  of  course, 
indispensable.     But  if   it   were   decisive   by   itself  alone,   we 
should  be  restricted  to  a  moral  postulate  in  the  sense  of  Kant. 

2.  This  postulate-standpoint,  however,  (a)  would  be  insuffi- 
cient, for  it  would  require  us  to  uplift  our  own  selves  on  the 
strength  of  our  own  moral  convictions  to  the  certainty  of  God, 


44     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

and  would  leave  us  in  doubt  as  to  whether  we  were  not  sup- 
porting ourselves  merely  on  the  uplifting,  subjective  thought 
of  God.  (b)  This  postulate  does  not  correspond  to  the  char- 
acter of  real  religion  (§7:2),  least  of  all  to  Christianity  with 
its  reference  to  revelation.1 

Note  to  §21:2 

1.  The  value-judgment  argument  has  as  its  necessary  correlate  the 
revelation-concept;  otherwise  it  lacks  objectivity. 

3.  Therefore  in  intimate  connection  with  the  worth-question, 
the  revelation-question  is  to  be  investigated  (v.  §§3,  7,  18). l 

Note  to  §21 : 3 

1.  The  Ritschlians  are  wrong  in  finding  only  value-judgment  in 
the  Christian  doctrine  of  the  resurrection,  and  ignoring  the  psycho- 
logical basis  of  the  value-judgment. 

Does  Christian  faith  need  to  be  distressed  by  the  vicissitudes  of 
critical  investigation?  Historical  science  cannot  give  immediate  cer- 
tainty of  God,  which  is  a  religious  acquisition ;  but  it  may  be  helpful 
to  religion  in  talcing  away  false  props.  Religion  has  its  hearth  and 
home  elsewhere. 

§22.  The  Revelation  of  God  in  the  Person  and  Spiritual  Work 
of  Jesus  Christ. 

1.  Where  does  the  redeeming  and  pedagogic  love  of  God 
disclose  itself  in  the  actual  world  in  a  way  that  convinces  and 
conquers  the  human  heart?     The  Christian  proclamation  it- 
self directs  our  attention  not  merely  to  single  individual  ex- 
periences, but  to  a  disclosure  belonging  to  human  history,  that 
is,  to  the  person  and  spirit-work  of  Jesus  Christ. 

2.  Jesus  Christ's  own  person  shows  in  his  entire  discourse, 
in  his  conduct,  in  his  sufferings  and  death,  that  God's  holy 
love  concerned  with  the  actualization  of  his  kingdom  was  in- 
expugnably  certain  to  Jesus  on  the  basis  of  his  inner  expe- 
rience.    Jesus  Christ's  own  person  shows  also  that  his  whole 
life  was  determined  by  this  inner  communion  with  God,  and 
was  unfolded,  drawn  out  in  the  service  of  God,  and  also  in  the 
service  of  holy  love  for  man.     Precisely  this  character  of  the 
person  of  Jesus  accredits  itself  to  our  hearts  and  conscience 
as  a  reality  of  the  supramundane  divine  life;  more  accurately, 
of  the  holy  love  of  God  in  that  life. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     45 

3.  But  Jesus'  person  is  not  to  be  considered  by  itself  alone. 
It  is  to  be  considered  in  its  effects.1  If  one  analyzes  the 
unitary,  spiritual  effect  which  has  gone  out  from  Jesus  within 
human  history  in  the  circle  of  his  immediate  followers,  and 
also  in  entire  subsequent  Christianity,  four  sides  of  that  effect 
may  be  distinguished,  viz.:  (a)  the  awakening  of  conscience 
to  the  recognition  of  that  which  we  men  fall  short  of,  and 
which  we  ought  to  be ;  (b)  the  peace  or  comfort  of  the  hunted 
and  fearful  conscience,  peace  and  comfort  which  Jesus  as 
Savior  brought  to  publicans  and  sinners,  and  since  then  to  all 
who  trust  in  him;  (c)  along  with  this,  at  the  same  time,  im- 
pulse and  ability  to  a  life  of  sanctification  through  discipline 
and  pruning,  especially  through  love;  and  (d)  power  to  over- 
come pain  and  death  by  communion  with  him.  But  all  these 
four  sides  in  the  present  spiritual  effects  of  Christianity  point 
us  back  to  Jesus  himself  as  the  personal  bearer  and  bringer 
of  this  resultful  spirit.  Therefore,  a  power  of  God  redeeming 
us  from  sin  and  the  world,  and  in  this  regard  supramundane, 
confronts  us  as  real  and  as  operative.2 

Notes  to  §22 :  3 

1.  Some   aspects  of  reality   cannot  be   fully   understood,   because 
that  reality  is  not  yet  finished.     The  effects  of  the  person  of  Jesus 
are  not  yet  ended. 

2.  It  is  not  quite  accurate  to  say  that  Jesus  does  it.     It  is  God  in 
him  that  does  it.     The  object  of  faith  is  God  himself;  but  the  dis- 
closure of  God  is  in  the  spirit  and  disposition  of  Jesus.     Not  Jesus 
with  God,  but  God  in  Jesus,  is  the  object  of  religious  faith. 

4.  Therefore  the  person  and  spirit  and  work  of  Jesus  Christ 
brings  us  face  to  face  with  the  decisive  question  of  trust  or 
confidence.     But  if  we  ourselves,  on  the  basis  of  the  impres- 
sion of  Jesus'  person  and  work,  surrender  ourselves  trustfully 
to  him,  we  can  have  the    experience  in  ourselves  that  the  spir- 
itual working  of  God,  and  therewith  of  God's  redeeming  and 
pedagogic  holy  love,  is  an  operative  reality  (v.  Titus  2:11, 
12). 

5.  The  spiritual  person  and  effectiveness  of  Jesus   Christ 
is  therefore  the  central  revelation  of  God,  in  the  last  analysis 
the  basis  of  faith.     It  is  only  from  the   standpoint  of  this 
revelation  that  all  further  disclosures  of  God  in  the  history  of 


46     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Jesus  himself,  in  Christianity,  or  in  our  own  lives,  are  in- 
telligible to  us.1 

Note  to  §22 :  5 

1.  As  we  could  not  know  man  by  a  mere  embryological  study,  so 
we  can  not  know  the  Christian  revelation  of  God  by  merely  investi- 
gating the  historic  Jesus  as  an  isolated  individual  and  apart  from; 
his  effectiveness  in  human  life  and  history. 

§23.  Justification  and  Amplification  of  the  Proof  from  Given 
Revelation. 

1.  Two  objections  of  the  most  serious  character  possible  are 
made  to  the  foregoing  argument  on  the  basis  of  revelation, 
(a)  First  objection:  Our  historical  knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ 
is  too  uncertain  for  faith  to  rest  upon  and  adhere  to  his  per- 
son.1 But  (a)  in  receptivity  for  the  impression  of  the  Jesus 
Christ  of  the  gospels  and  for  his  spirit-work  in  Christianity 
with  which  we  come  into  contact,  and  (ft)  in  one's  own  ex- 
perience of  his  redemptive  power,  an  experience  flowing  from 
faith,  an  immediate  certainty  of  the  divine  spirit  in  him  and 
in  his  work  may  be  gained.2  (b)  Second  objection:  Jesus 
Christ,  as  member  of  history,  cannot  be  bearer  of  absolutely 
divine  life  and  of  absolute  truth,  but  can  have  only  relative 
importance.3  But  this  affirmation  is  itself  only  a  dogma  either 
of  (a)  pantheistic  faith,  or  of  (ft)  a  natural  science  theory 
of  evolution.4 

Notes  to  §23 : 1 

1.  It  is  not  the  man  who  has  not  certainty  that  Jesus  existed  that 
is  none  of  his ;  it  is  he  who  has  not  the  spirit  of  Christ  that  is  none  of 
his.     This  is  what  I  say  to  myself  in  these  days  in  which  the  his- 
toricity of  Jesus  is  denied  (e.  g.,  by  Kalthoff ) ;  but  I  am  not  quite 
certain  about  the  matter,  for  the  question  arises,  Can  we  have  the 
spirit  of  Christ,  if  we  lose  the  certainty  that  Jesus  existed  ? 

2.  This  was  written  before  I  fell  into  a  degree  of  doubt  about  the 
matter. 

Historical  science  will  keep  on  erecting  Jesus  into  a  problem; 
otherwise  it  becomes  static,  and  science  dies.  The  certainty  we 
need  is  religious  as  against  historical  certainty.  Its  basis  is  not  an 
historical  scientific  inquiry,  but  a  moral  and  religious  experience. 

3.  Objection  (a)  is  the  most  serious  that  can  possibly  arise  on  ac- 
count of  the  work  of  historical  science;  objection  (b),  the  most  serious 
that  can  arise  on  account  of  philosophical  developments.     The  Hegel- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     47 

ian  philosophy  urges  that  it  is  not  like  the  Idea  to  shake  out  all 
its  fulness  into  a  single  historic  exemplar.  This  would  mean  the 
necessary  relativity  of  any  Jesus  of  history. 

[Professor  William  Adams  Brown  relates  that  on  one  occasion  he 
asked  Professor  Foster  the  question,  "What  problem  are  you  work- 
ing on  now  ? "  and  received  the  reply,  "  I  am  looking  for  the  Ab- 
solute in  history,  and  I  am  convinced  that  unless  we  can  find  it,  it 
will  be  fatal  for  the  Christian  religion."] 

4.  The  philosopher  would  prove  that  Jesus  is  relative,  by  saying 
that  everything  in  history  is  relative;  but  how  will  he  prove  that 
everything  historical  is  relative?  When  it  is  affirmed  that  the  abso- 
lute is  to  be  found  in  the  historic  Jesus,  that  it  is  dogma  does  not 
disprove  it. 

Naturalism  would  explain  Jesus  as  remainderless  construction  of 
environmental  forces.  Now  we  may  admit  the  traditional  and  evo- 
lutionary factors  in  the  life  of  Jesus;  but  it  is  still  true  that  no 
consciousness  can  be  remainder lessly  explained  by  external  forces. 
There  is  a  moment  of  spontaneity  in  every  personality.  And  as- 
suredly there  is  an  active  and  creative  moment  in  the  conscious- 
ness of  Jesus.  It  is  a  judgment  of  faith  that  Jesus  Christ  is  self- 
uplifted  above  the  whole  evolutionary  series;  and  this  judgment  of 
faith  science  can  neither  establish  nor  refute.  Spontaneity  and 
novelty  are  not  breaches  of  continuity,  for  they  are  everywhere.  It 
is  only  a  higher  degree  of  empirical  inexplicability  that  we  find  in 
Jesus.  The  principle  of  activity  is  original;  for  if  the  static  were 
original,  nothing  could  get  started.  Why  may  not  an  entirely  new 
spiritual  force  appear  in  the  cosmos?  May  not  the  cosmos  be  like 
a  symphony,  with  a  new  instrument  appearing?  The  ongoing  of 
existence  is  not  at  an  even  pace.  There  have  been  times  when  a 
thousand  years  have  been  £s  a  day,  and  there  have  been  crises  in 
which  one  day  has  been  as  a  thousand  years.  Even  new  species  may 
appear  by  mutation,  in  a  single  leap.  And  so  the  affirmation  that 
Jesus  is  purely  relative  and  to  be  transcended  in  history,  is  a  dogma; 
it  is  not  a  necessity  of  scientific  and  philosophical  reflection. 

2.  A  philosophical  amplification  of  the  given  revelation- 
proof,  as  already  of  the  worth-proof  (§20),  may  be  attempted. 
We  relate  the  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ  to  the  rest  of  human 
history  in  its  actual  course,  (a)  Suppose  we  consider  reve- 
lation on  the  basis  of  the  religious  and  moral  development  of 
humanity.  It  may  be  viewed  as  consummation  of  that  which 
was  actually  sought  by  man  in  that  development,  or  which  was 
only  approximately  gained  therein.  That  is,  it  may  be  the 
fruition  of  man's  own  yearning.  To  be  sure  the  Christian 
historico-philosophical  treatment  must  grant  the  impenetrabil- 


48     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ity  of  many  intricate  waves  of  religious  and  moral  history, 
especially  on  account  of  the  disturbing  encroachments  of  hu- 
man sin  in  the  course  of  that  history,  (b)  Conversely,  sup- 
pose we  consider  human  history  from  the  standpoint  of  revela- 
tion. Then  that  history  gains  for  us  its  spiritual  meaning 
and  point  of  unity  first  through  the  actualization  of  divine 
life  in  Jesus  Christ ;  in  him  the  acme  of  history  is  given,  but 
at  the  same  time  the  starting  point  of  a  new  life,  which  is 
itself  capable  again  of  infinite  unfolding.1 

Note  to  §23:2 

1.  Is  the  redemptive  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ  new  in  content? 

3.  On  the  basis  of  this  amplification  critical  comparison  may 
be  elaborated  (as  was  done  in  §20:  13).  (a)  Christianity  as 
compared  with  other  religions,  rests  on  a  convincing  and  com- 
prehensive revelation,  (b)  It  is  superior  to  the  two  world- 
views  previously  mentioned,  viz.  aesthetic  pantheism  and  pes- 
simism (§18:2,  3);  superior  not  only  in  its  worth,  but  su- 
perior in  its  understanding  of  the  world;  superior  not  only 
religiously,  but  also  philosophically  (for  there  is  implicit  in 
Christianity  a  world- view  of  its  own). 

§24.  Connection  between  the  Revelation-Proof  and  the  Worth- 
Proof. 

1.  The  revelation-proof  is  most  intimately  connected  with 
the  worth-proof,  (a)  That  which  is  worthful  in  Christian 
faith,  viz.  the  consummation  or  perfecting  of  man  and  of  hu- 
manity, is  revealed  in  it,  is  already  reality  in  the  being  and 
work  of  Jesus  Christ.1  (b)  The  reality  to  which  Christian 
faith  holds  is  known  only  in  his  name,  and  it  is  understood 
and  experienced  in  his  redeeming  worth. 

Note  to  §24 : 1 

1.  What  is  the  distinctive  peculiarity  of  Jesus?  It  is  his  faith  in 
the  infinite  worth  of  human  personality  before  God.  This  accounts 
for  his  attitude  toward  sinners  and  toward  children,  and  for  such 
sayings  as  that  about  the  sun  and  rain  on  the  evil  and  the  good. 

How  did  he  get  that  faith?  Not  from  his  environment.  At  that 
time  emphasis  was  laid  upon  the  worthlessness  of  man.  He  got  his 
estimate  of  human  worth  from  his  own  human  self-consciousness, 
and  he  interpreted  God  as  being  like  what  he  found  in  himself. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     49 

I  am  more  and  more  struck  with  the  way  Jesus  falls  in  line  with 
humanism.  And  the  modern  type  of  Christianity  is  Christian  hu- 
manism. Once,  people  made  little  of  man,  in  order  to  make  much 
of  God.  Now  we  must  make  much  of  man,  if  we  are  to  make  much 
of  God.  And  as  for  Jesus  Christ,  we  must  insist  on  his  humanity, 
if  we  are  to  see  his  dignity.  The  old  view  was  that  in  spite  of  his 
humanity  he  was  great.  The  modern  view  is  that  through  his  human- 
ity he  was  great. 

2.  It  is  precisely  in  this  reciprocal  relationship  of  the  worth- 
proof  and  the  revelation-proof  that  the  practical  proof  of  the 
truth  of  the  Christian  faith  is  to  be  found  as  a  whole.  The 
sum  of  it  is  this,  viz.:  The  need  of  man  (cf.  §7: 1)  — and 
indeed  not  the  accidental  but  the  supreme  spiritual-moral  need 
of  man  —  is  not  merely  awakened,  but  perfectly  satisfied  and 
stilled  by  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  (cf.  §7:  2). 

d.  INFERENCES  FROM  THE  CHRISTIAN  REVELATION-CONCEPT. 

§25.  The  Fundamental  Character  of  the  Christian  Revelation- 
Concept. 

1.  The  Christian  concept  of  revelation  is  implicitly  gained 
by  means  of  the  proof  of  the  given  revelation.  At  all  events 
it  is  different  from  the  revelation-concept  of  the  orthodox  ec- 
clesiastical dogmatics.  The  latter  rests  on  the  equivalence  of 
revelatio  specialis  with  the  Sacred  Scriptures.  In  consequence 
of  this,  revelation  is  conceived  (a)  as  communication  of  doc- 
trine; (b)  as  internally  authoritative  and  statutory;  (c)  as 
miraculous  in  the  sense  that  main  stress  is  placed  upon  the 
absence  of  natural  mediations;  (d)  as  historyless.1 

Note  to  §25 : 1 

1.  Given  the  old  Weltanschauung,  it  was  hard  to  escape  the  or- 
thodox conception  of  revelation. 

2.  This  revelation-concept  of  orthodoxy  has  experienced  a 
sharp  and  definitive  criticism  by  rationalism.     But  rational- 
ism did  not  extricate  itself  from  the  orthodox  putting  of  the 
question.     It  was  with  Schleiermacher  that  the  gradual  trans- 
formation of  the  revelation-concept  set  in. 

3.  In  opposition  to   (a)   the  orthodox  ecclesiastical  as  well 
as  to  (0)  the  rationalistic  and  (y)  the  modern  liberalistic  con- 


50     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ceptions,  revelation  is  to  be  understood  directly  on  the  basis 
of  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  on  that  basis,  is  to  be  de- 
fined as  follows:  (a)  Revelation  is,  more  centrally,  disclosure 
of  personal  life  in  which  God  is  known  and  experienced.  The 
concept  of  external  revelation  is  not  to  be  subordinated  or 
retired  in  favor  of  an  inner  revelation.  To  be  sure  every 
revelation  of  God  necessarily  involves  an  effect  upon  the  inner 
life;  but  it  is  essential  to  Christian  faith  to  keep  to  outward 
historical  disclosures  of  God  from  which  this  inner  effect 
emanates.1  (b)  Revelation  has  the  character  of  (a)  an  in- 
wardly grounded  authority,  so  far  as  it  accredits  itself  as  such 
in  conscience;  2  and  of  (/8)  a  norm  of  freedom,  in  that  it  re- 
quires only  full  acknowledgment,  recognition,  assent.8  Thus 
the  liberalistic  reproach  of  blind  authority-faith  and  of  external 
positivism  is  done  away  with,  and  yet  justice  is  done  to  the 
orthodox  thought  of  an  authority  for  faith  and  of  a  positive 
historical  basis  of  Christianity,  (c)  Revelation  is  the  con- 
summation or  the  perfecting  of  human  nature  for  its  eternal 
destiny  and  vocation.  Thus  revelation  signifies  the  entrance, 
not  unmediated,  of  a  truly  supramundane  life,  and  of  the 
Spirit  in  our  world,  (d)  Revelation  is  an  historical  phe- 
nomenon which  is  yet  super-historical  in  content  and  kind,  i.  e. 
transcends  the  temporal,  finite,  in  its  content  of  life,  and  in  its 
efficiency  encroaches  into  the  time  series  of  history.  Thus 
understood  the  concept  of  revelation  designates  Jesus  Christ 
not  only  as  starting-point  of  the  Christian  religion,  but  as 
permanent  center  of  the  personal  religious  life.  To  be  sure, 
there  are  many  roads  that  lead  to  faith,  and  many  stimuli  of 
the  Christian  life  without  direct  relation  to  Jesus  Christ.  But 
it  is  only  through  this  latter  that  Christianity  is  vigorous  and 
procreative. 

Notes  to  §25 : 3 

1.  The  merit  of  rationalism   was   its   subjectivity,   its   insistence 
upon  the  inwardness  of  revelation.     The  merit  of  orthodoxy  was  its 
objectivity,  its  insistence  upon  the  outwardness  of  revelation.     Here 
the  point  was  to  avoid  limiting  revelation  to  subjective  experience  in 
the  absence  of  any  stimulus  for  that  experience;  in  other  words,  to 
avoid  illusion. 

2.  Karl  Pearson  points  out  that  science  will  oppose  the  concept 
of  revelation  only  when  it  is  appealed  to  in  justification  of  conduct, 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     51 

but  will  oppose  it  then  in  the  interest  of  the  moral  function  of  science 
(as  seen  in  scientific  ethics). 

3.  Revelation  is  a  stimulus  which  requires  a  free  moral  response 
to  it.    But  revelation  as  Catholicism  conceives  it  does  not  admit  of 
free  assent. 

4.  Accordingly,  therefore,  revelation  in  the  Christian  sense 
may  be  defined  as  a  disclosure  of  God  within  human  history 
for  the  purpose  of  our  salvation  —  a  disclosure  which  sustains 
and  gives  norm  to  the  faith  of  the  Christian.     As  to  the  Bible 
we  may  say,  Only  that  in  the  Bible  is  authoritative  which  is 
revelation  of  God,  and  only  that  in  the  Bible  is  revelation  of 
God  which  is  capable  of  being  mediated  by  religious  faith.1  2 

Notes  to  §25 :  4 

1.  The  supramundane  has  to  do  with  values.     What  does  the  will 
will?     Can  the  will  strive  for  more  time  and  space?     Or  does  it 
strive  for  more  significance,  value,  meaning?     What  does  the  will 
desire?     Is  striving  for  eternal  life  striving  for  more  time,  or  striving 
for   value?     (Cf.    Munsterb'erg :     The    Eternal    Life.)     Miinsterberg 
believes  in  the  eternity  of  the  values,  but  he  does  not  make  the  con- 
nection between  the  value  and  whom  the  value  is  for. 

2.  To  me,  "  fact "  means  what  I  cannot  deny. 

§26.  The  Content  of  the  Christian  Revelation-Concept  in  Re- 
lation to  the  New  Testament  Proclamation  of  Jesus  Christ. 

1.  The  decisive,  central  revelation  of  God  is  in  Jesus  Christ, 
in  his  personal  spirit  and  efficacy  (§22:5).  The  question 
then  arises,  What  is  the  relation  of  the  various  single  sides  of 
the  New  Testament  narrative  and  witness  concerning  the  being 
and  work  of  the  earthly  and  exalted  Jesus  Christ  to  this  cen- 
tral revelation?  This  question  does  not  exist  for  those  who 
hold  that  the  whole  Biblical  Christ  is,  as  "undivided  and  in- 
divisible unity,"  revelation  of  God.  But  owing  to  the  char- 
acter of  the  Biblical  proclamation  as  a  whole,  which  is  an 
articulated  thing,  and  owing  to  the  question  as  to  how,  on  our 
part,  we  can  attain  to  inner  understanding  and  to  independent 
certainty  of  faith  concerning  the  single  sides  of  the  Biblical 
Christ,  we  are  under  the  inner  necessity  of  signalizing  one 
center  of  faith  within  the  Biblical  collective  witness  (Gospels 
and  Epistles)  concerning  Jesus  Christ.  That  center  is  the 
so-called  historical  Christ,  the  Savior-person  of  Jesus  Christ 


52     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  its  spiritual  being  and  work,  belonging  to  our  human  his- 
tory. It  is  only  from  the  standpoint  of  this  center  that  the 
single  moments  of  the  narrative  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  members 
of  the  revelation  of  God,  can  be  understood,  and  the  various 
witnesses  of  him  can  be  evaluated. 

2.  Jesus'  words  are  revelation  in  the  degree  that  they  in- 
terpret what  is  embedded  in  his  Savior-person.     His  deeds  and 
suffering  are  revelation  in  the  degree  that  they  are  part  of  his 
work  as  Savior.     The  miraculous  deeds  of  Jesus  Christ  are 
not  as  such  the  decisive  criterion  of  the  revelation  of  God  to 
him;  but  if  we  are  made  certain  of  these  deeds  through  his 
person    as    Savior    (not    by    historical    science),    the    powers 
(8wa/n«s)  of  Jesus  in  their  importance  for  his  redemptive  work 
become  to  us  members  of  the  total  revelation  given  in  him. 

3.  It   is  only  on  the  basis   of  the  center  designated,   i.  e. 
on  the  basis  of  the  supramundane  content  of  the  person  of  Jesus 
that  we  can  be  certain  that  the  appearances  of  the  Crucified 
One  to  his  disciples  were  not  illusions,  but  divine  revelations, 
by  means  of  which  the  Crucified  One  was  declared  to  be  the 
Lord  that  overcame  the  world  and  death.     Only  this  revelation 
in  the  Risen  One,  terminating  the  earthly  life  of  Jesus,  casts 
full  light  backward  on  the  power  and  worth  of  Jesus'  earthly 
life-work,  and  forward  on  the  life  and  work  of  the  Exalted 
Christ  and  God's  saving  power.1     The  New  Testament  revela- 
tion of  God  is  closed  in  the  crucified  and  risen  Jesus  Christ, 
and  accordingly  there  is  full  Christian  revelation-faith  only 
where  the  surrender  and  trust  toward  Jesus'  earthly  person 
culminates  in  the  certainty  of  faith  in  his  appearances  after 
death.     So  only  do  we  appreciate  the  full  power  of  his  person 
in  its  saving  value  upon  those  who  felt  that  power  in  his  life. 

Note  to  §26 :  3 

1.  See  Arnold  Meyer:    Die  AuferstcKung  Christi. 

4.  The  revelation  of  God,  which  was  concluded  as  above, 
continues  in  the  further  course  of  history  in  a  certain  sense.1 
(a)   This  Jesus  Christ  and  the  will  of  God  in  him  are  in- 
wardly revealed  to  every  believer,     (b)   In  the  spiritual  power 
of  the  Christianity  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  power  of  the  Spirit 
and  God's  plan  of  redemption  are  further  made  known,     (c) 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     53 

Yet  all  this  is  not  a  new  revelation  of  God  as  to  content,  for 
new  revelation  would  carry  with  it  a  new  religion.  It  is  only 
the  effective  unfolding  of  the  one  regulative  revelation  of  God 
in  Jesus  Christ,  and  of  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ. 

Note  to  §26 : 4 

1.  Science  is  a  revelation  of  God,  a  revelation  that  Jesus  did  not 
make.  The  same  is  true  of  art.  But  at  one  point  —  in  his  inner 
disposition,  his  attitude  toward  God  and  man  —  Jesus  made  a  revela- 
tion that  has  not  been  surpassed.  To  Christian  faith  it  is  satisfactory 
and  unsurpassable,  but  its  unsurpassableness  is  not  scientifically 
demonstrable. 

The  Messianic  consciousness  of  Jesus  did  not  permit  him  to  reveal 
the  wealth  of  ultimate  reality  in  the  realms  of  science,  art,  and  the 
order  of  the  state. 

Arnold  Meyer  says  that  in  Jesus  humanity  revealed  its  innermost 
secret,  viz.  that  everyone  who  bears  a  human  countenance  immedi- 
ately belongs  to  God,  and  is,  each  in  his  own  way,  an  image  of  God. 
Now  every  man  ought  to  be  brought  to  this  consciousness,  and  if  this 
is  to  be  done,  it  must  be  done  by  some  one.  Is  every  one  competent 
to  do  it?  Is  every  one  competent  to  perform  a  similar  service  in  art, 
in  science,  or  in  government?  There  must,  of  course,  be  some- 
thing Shakespeare-like  in  all  of  us,  or  Shakespeare  would  not  grip 
us;  and  there  must  be  something  Jesus-like  in  all  of  us,  or  Jesus 
would  not  appeal  to  us.  But  it  is  in  the  presence  of  Shakespeare, 
not  in  his  absence,  that  we  can  become  like  Shakespeare;  and  it  is 
in  the  presence  of  Jesus,  not  in  his  absence,  that  we  can  become  like 
Jesus. 

§27.  The  Question  of  the  Extension  of  the  Revelation-Concept 
to  Old  Testament  History  and  to  Extra-Christian  Hu- 
manity. 

1.  From  the  Christian  standpoint  we  recognize  by  faith  the 
final  revelation  of  God,  regulative  for  us,  in  Jesus  Christ  alone.1 
But  the  Old  Testament  history,  evaluated  from  the  Christian 
standpoint,  is  preparatory  revelation  of  God,  or  it  is  the  basis 
and  soil  of  the  Old  Testament.  That  is  to  say  (a)  on  the  one 
hand,  that  the  God  who  has  revealed  himself  in  Jesus  Christ 
gradedly  actualized  his  redemptive  will  in  the  history  of  the 
people  of  Israel,  which  was  a  coherent,  teleologically  ordered 
history.  A  religio-ethical  knowledge  and  life  was  awakened 
there,  which  approximated  the  Christian,  but  of  course  in  va- 
rious degrees.  It  was  awakened  (a)  by  divine  guidance  of 


54     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

this  people,  as  well  as  (/?)  by  prophetic  personalities.  The 
pedagogic  efficiency  of  God  was  carried  on  in  this  way  (v. 
Lessing's  Education  of  the  Human  Race},  (b)  On  the  other 
hand,  this  pedagogic  efficiency  of  God  did  not  reach  its  goal 
on  the  soil  of  that  history,  but  first  in  Jesus  Christ.  Thus 
the  moral  religious  knowledge  and  life  of  Israel  points  on  be- 
yond itself.  A  new  covenant  is  promised,  even  in  the  Old 
Testament  itself.  Besides,  there  are  thoughts  and  problems 
in  the  Old  Testament  which  begin  to  break  through  the  pale 
of  the  Old  Testament  religion,  e.  g.  internal  and  external  uni- 
versalism.  (c)  For  us  Christians  this  preparatory  revelation 
of  God  is  not  the  decisive  ground  and  regulative  norm  of  faith. 
It  is,  however,  means  to  pedagogic  introduction  into  the  Chris- 
tian faith;  also  confirmation  and  enrichment  of  that  faith. 
The  Old  and  New  Covenant  together  form  one  revelation-his- 
tory, combined  ir  Jesus  Christ. 

Note  to  §27:1 

1.  The  precepts  of  Jesus  are  not  to  be  isolated  from  his  time  and 
self,  and  erected  in  a  legalistic  way  as  a  norm  for  life.     Even  the 
spirit  of  Jesus  is  not  to  be  externally  copied.     And  yet  the  ultimate 
consummation  of  human  personality  and  of  society  is  in  and  through 
the  efficiency  of  the  spirit  which  was  in  Jesus. 

2.  Already  according  to  §23 :  2  the  pagan  development  is 
not  to  be  put  outside  all  teleological  connection  with  the  revela- 
tion of  God  in  Jesus  Christ.     Within  the  former  also  there 
are  revelations  of  God,  in  nature  and  in  history,  also  in  the 
religions,  and  especially  in  the  moral  history,  in  conscience  and 
especially  in  great  personalities,  in  guiding  spirits ;  elements 
of  Christian  truth  are  to  be  found  in  the  religious  life  of  extra- 
Christian   peoples.     But  we  have   there  no  unitary  develop- 
ment leading  directly  to  the  Christian  revelation,  as  is  the  case 
in  Israel.     We  have  rather  a  manifold   striving  among  the 
various  peoples  on  the  basis  of  the  forms  of  revelation  just 
mentioned.     This  striving  calls  upon  Christianity  as  a  ques- 
tion for  an  answer.     But  in  the  attempted  solutions,  in  spite 
of  many  approximations  to  Christianity,  it  is  ever  again  de- 
flected from  the  path  that  leads  to  Christianity,  be  it  (a)  in 
nature  worship,  or  (b)  in  the  humanization  of  the  gods,  and 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     55 

pantheism,  or  (c)  in  external  legality,  or  (d)  in  false  ways  of 
redemption,  as  set  forth  in  §12:  3. 

C.    THE  KNOWLEDGE  WHICH  ACCRUES  TO  CHRISTIAN 
FAITH,  AND  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS 

a.  THE  CHARACTER  OF  THE  KNOWLEDGE  WHICH  ACCRUES  TO 

THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGIOUS  FAITH,  AND  OF  THE  THEO- 

LOGICO-SciENTIFIC  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THAT  WHICH 

is  BELIEVED. 

§28.  Christian  Religious  Knowledge  as  Faith's  Understand- 
ing of  Revelation. 

1.  The  character,  or  species,  of  the  knowledge  of  Christian 
truth  is  determined   according  to  one's  view  concerning  the 
proof  of  the  truth  of  Christianity.     According  to  its  essence 
it  is  as  follows:     (a)    Understanding  of  the  revelation  of  God 
in   Jesus    Christ.     The   invisible   spiritual   reality   above   us, 
around  us,  for  us,  in  us  and  before  us,  which   Christianity 
proclaims  becomes   certain    and   understandable   through    the 
revelation  sketched  and  articulated  in   §§25,   27.     According 
to  the  New  Testament,  it  is  accessible  to  us  only  through  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  because  this  Spirit  proceeds  from  Jesus 
Christ  through  the  revelation  of  God  in  him.      (b)   Faith's 
understanding  of  that  revelation.     One  can  become  aware  of 
that  revelation  only  by  trustful  surrender  and  there  can  be  a 
personal  experience  only  on  the  basis  of  this  faith,  i.  e.  a  per- 
ception of  its  effects  in  our  own  life  (§22:  4). 

2.  The  knowledge  which  accrues  to  Christian  faith  is,  ac- 
cordingly, fastened  to  personal  conditions;  i.  e.  (a)  to  the  will- 
ingness to  acknowledge  and  fulfil  Jesus'  moral  requirements, 
and   (b)   to  the  willingness  to  accept  his  redeeming  benefits. 
Therefore  the  conviction  of  faith  is  one  that  grows  with  the 
growing   Christian   personality.     This    is   true    of   knowledge 
which  accrues  to  experience.     One  can  experience  God's  power 
only  by  venturing  upon  that  power  by  faith,  in  the  tasks  and 
conduct  of  life. 

3.  The  knowledge  which  accrues  to  Christian  faith  finds  its 
immediate  expression  in  enthusiastic  confession  of  what  is  be- 
lieved or  of  what  is  experienced  in  faith.1     This  confession 


56     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

is  usually  fixed  in  the  Christian  community  in  articles  of 
faith.  These  are  designations  of  invisible  spiritual  realities 
of  which  the  Christian  can  and  should  become  aware  through 
confidence  in  God's  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ. 

Note  to  §28  :  3 

1.  Normally  there  is  no  confessionless  faith.  Like  patriotism,  faith 
must  externalize  itself.  Only  as  it  expresses  itself  does  it  realize 
itself. 


§29.  Scientific  Dogmatics  in  its  Distinction  from  the  Knowl- 
edge which  Accrues  to  Christian  Faith. 

1.  The  theological-cognitive  work  of  scientific  dogmatics  is 
different  from  the  knowledge  which  accrues  to  personal  faith 
(cf.  the  problem  in  §1).1  This  difference  consists  in  the 
methodically  prosecuted  reflection  (a)  concerning  the  grounds 
of  our  certainty  of  the  reality  of  the  invisible  world  of  faith, 
in  which  the  Christian  lives,  (b)  concerning  what  belongs  to 
that  world,  and  (c)  concerning  how  it  is  related  to  the  know- 
able,  empirical  world  of  science.  On  the  one  side,  the  work  of 
dogmatics  is  closely  related  to  the  life  of  faith,  for  the  reflec- 
tion referred  to  above  will  be  possible  only  to  him  who  earnestly 
desires  to  live  in  Christian  faith.  On  the  other  side,  the  work 
of  dogmatics  is  different  from  the  life  of  faith  as  such,  and 
the  capacity  for  the  former  depends  upon  entirely  different 
conditions  from  the  personal  knowledge  that  accrues  to  faith.2 

Notes  to  §29  :  1 

1.  The  difference  is  similar  to  that  between  practical,  experiential 
knowledge  of  the  world  and  the  scientific  knowledge  of  the  world. 

2.  It  would  seem  as  if  the  endowments  and  tasks  of  the  prophet 
tended  to  incapacitate  him  for  the  sobriety  and  impartiality  of  dis- 
interested scientific  reflection.     Still,  the  theologian  must  be  a  man 
of  faith  and  a  man  of  scientific  reflection. 

2.  Accordingly  the  exposition  of  scientific  dogmatics  is  dif- 
ferent from  the  confessional  expression  of  personal  faith.1 
Christian  dogmatics,  in  the  propositions  developed  by  it,  strives 
(a)  for  as  clear  an  exposition  as  possible  of  the  principles  or 
grounds  decisive  for  faith  itself,  (b)  for  definiteness  and 
sharpness  of  concepts,  (c)  for  completeness  and  independence, 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     57 

(d)  for  inner  connection  and  yet  clear  demarcation  between 
it  and  the  theoretical  knowledge  of  the  world;  and  dogmatics 
does  not  strive  (e)  for  homiletic  testimony  and  edification. 
Note  to  §29 :  2 

1.  There  is  a  difference  between  theology  and  preaching.  The  latter 
should  be  the  immediate  testimony  which  is  the  dynamic  in  religion. 
The  theologian,  on  the  contrary,  must  not  assume  the  attitude  of  the 
mere  homilist;  his  special  concern  is  methodical,  scientific  formula- 
tion of  religious  conviction.  But  theology  is  necessary  for  perma- 
nent effectiveness.  Preaching  begins  with  inner  certainty.  When 
doubt  comes  with  further  experience,  reflective  certainty  must  then 
be  achieved.  We  must  earn  it;  we  cannot  take  it  as  a  gift  The 
modern  preacher  has  to  make  himself  an  epitome  of  the  past  two 
hundred  and  fifty  years.  In  patience  let  him  possess  his  soul,  and  he 
will  have  his  message.  The  patient,  long  way  is  the  sure  and  strong 
way. 

3.  But  with  all  its  conceptual  sharpness  and  defmiteness, 
dogmatics  cannot  fully  exclude  (a)  Biblical  expressions  from 
its  designation  of  the  reality  of  faith,1  nor  (b)  the  analogies 
of  human  life.  But  it  must  seek  to  use  these  expressions  and 
analogies  so  that  they  shall  correctly  and  clearly  designate 
what  is  experienced  by  the  Christian  in  his  living  faith  in 
Jesus  Christ. 
Note  to  §29 : 3 

1.  Biedermann,  in  the  constructive  part  of  his  dogmatics,  does 
away  with  Biblical  expressions,  and  makes  use  of  the  Hegelian  jargon 
of  aseity,  proseity,  etc.  The  result  is  a  metaphysic  of  religion  which 
is  the  least  interesting  part  of  his  work.  To  the  historical  and  critical 
part  of  his  book,  however,  I  am  indebted  probably  more  than  to  any 
other  one  book  in  theology. 

§30.  The  Relation  of  the  Knowledge  which  Accrues  to  Faith, 
and  the  Relation  of  Dogmatics  also,  to  the  Theoretical 
Knowledge  of  the  World. 

1.  The  knowledge  which  accrues  to  faith  and  the  theoretical 
knowledge  of  the  world  are  different  (cf.  §17:  2;  §28;  §9:3). 

(a)  They  are  different  as  to  their  foundations.     The  former 
reposes  on  the  persuasion  and  conviction  of  conscience  through 
divine  revelation;  the  latter  on  the  necessitation  of  idea  and 
judgment  through  perception  and  the  laws  of  logical  thought.1 

(b)  They  are  different  as  to  their  character.     The  former  is 


58     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODEEN  EXPRESSION 

a  trusted  acquaintanceship;  the  latter  an  apprehending  and 
ordering  of  the  given  in  our  forms  of  thought  (v.  §8 :  2).2  (c) 
They  are  different  as  to  their  goal.  The  former  seeks  to  un- 
derstand the  purpose  of  the  world  and  of  God  as  the  Founder 
and  Preserver  and  Guide  of  the  World;  the  latter  seeks  to 
explain  the  world  as  a  system  of  concepts  and  laws.8 

Notes  to  §30 : 1 

1.  See  F.  W.  Roberston's  Sermon  on  Conscience. 

2.  The  difference  is  similar  to  that  between  knowing  a  man  and 
knowing  a  proposition.     The  latter  is  easily  done,  but  the  former 
takes  time. 

3.  Scientific   knowledge   has   for   its   ultimate   presupposition   the 
unity  which  underlies  its  principle  of  natural  causation.     Religious 
knowledge  is  not  content  with  just  that  unity,  but  must  have  it  en- 
riched.    The  problem  is  the  inner  synthesis  of  the  scientific  and  the 
religious.     Will  the  conviction  suffice  for  religion,  that  the  structure 
and  function  of  the  universe  are  such  as  to  render  the  production  of 
values  possible  ?     Is  this  what  "  God  "  symbolizes  ?     Can  we  escape 
the  coincidence  of  the  theistic  and  the  cosmic  conceptions?     The  cos- 
mic process  is  meaningful  for  us  in  our  production  of  values.     Is  this 
the  religious  conviction,  and  is  it  adequate  to  life? 

Personality  is  another  symbol.  Instead  of  the  old  "  soul "  we  have 
now  the  progressive  synthesis  of  experience.  Is  there  a  progressive 
synthesis  of  cosmic  experience?  The  new  "cosmos"  is  a  great 
triumph  of  science  over  sense  in  any  case,  and  perhaps  "  personality  " 
is  our  best  symbol  after  all,  even  in  cosmology. 

2.  But  the  difference  referred  to  (in  1,  above)  does  not 
amount  to  relationlessness.  Not  only  are  there  connecting 
links  between  the  knowledge  which  accrues  to  Christian  faith 
and  the  theoretical  knowledge  of  the  world  but  the  two  touch 
in  the  object*  (a)  The  faith-knowledge  draws  the  knowable 
world  into  its  region ;  not  that  it  seeks  to  explain  that  world 
causally,  as  science  counts  causal  explanation;  but  it  seeks 
to  understand  that  world  in  its  meaning.2  (b)  However  faith- 
knowledge  does  not  limit  itself  thereby  to  the  bounds  of  the 
empirically  given  world,  but  mounts  above  it  and  beyond  it 
to  the  reality  (to  faith)  of  the  divine  will  with  its  supra- 
mundane  ends.  The  task  of  teleologically  articulating  the  em- 
pirically given  knowable  world  into  the  world  of  faith  follows 
for  the  knowledge  which  accrues  to  faith  from  (a)  and  (b) 
above,  taken  together. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     59 

Notes  to  §30 : 2 

1.  Faith  affirms  teleology;  modern  science  affirms  causality  simply. 
The  so-called  "  religion  of  science,"  a  religion  of  causality  without 
teleology,  has  failed. 

2.  Philosophy  mediates  between  science  and  religion,  between  de- 
scription and  valuation. 

3.  For  the  knowledge  which  accrues  to  personal  faith,  this 
arrangement  and  articulation  must  begin  by  learning  to  under- 
stand the  history  and  tasks  of  one's  own  life  as  the  leadings 
and  requirements  of  God  for  our  salvation,1  and  it  must  strive 
forward  to  the  goal  that  the  world  in  general  is  understand- 
able to  us  by  faith  as  the  theater  for  introducing  the  kingdom 
of  God.     To  be  sure,  riddles  of  life  and  of  the  world  remain 
which  require  the  conflict  of  faith;  but  faith  is  enriched  by 
every  solution  which  it  makes,  and  strengthened  by  every  true 
conflict.2 

Notes  to  §30 :  3 

1.  One's  vocation  should  be  not  only  means  to  getting  one's  daily 
bread,  but  instrumental  to  the  working  out  of  our  redemption.     "  Be- 
ing saved"  is  the  constant  maturing  of  character,  and  is  effected  in 
the  daily  vocation. 

2.  A  mother  who  lost  three  children  in  the  Iroquois  fire  could 
find  no  religious  consolation  until  she  accepted  the  thought  that  God 
is  in  fire,  as  well  as  in  Jesus.     Fire  is  God's  fire,  and  he  does  not 
suspend  its  nature. 

4.  Scientific  Christian  dogmatics  can  only  aim  (a)  on  the 
one  side  to  make  clear  by  methodic  reflection  the  inalien- 
able affirmations  and  limits  of  the  faith-knowledge ;  (b)  on  the 
other  side  to  test  by  methodic  criticism  the  picture  of  the  world 
of  present  science,  as  to  its  principles;  and  on  the  basis  of  (a) 
and  (b),  (c)  to  bring  to  as  clear  an  exposition  as  possible  the 
teleological  articulation  of  nature  and  history,  as  these  present 
themselves  to  our  present  scientific  knowledge,  (d)  Yet  scien- 
tific dogmatics  has  no  specifically  different  means  of  solving 
the  riddles  of  life  and  of  the  world  than  faith  itself  has. 
Moreover,  with  all  its  endeavor  at  a  Christian  natural  and 
historical  philosophy,  dogmatics  will  be  able  to  produce  only 
piece  work ;  as  Paul  says,  "  We  know  in  pe.rt,"  even  at  the 
best,1 


60     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Note  to  §30 : 4 

1.  Ostwald  and  Mach  have  worked  out  their  philosophies  of  nature 
as  if  there  was  nothing  in  the  world  called  the  Christian  religion, 
and  yet  they  have  made  valuable  contributions  to  Christian  apolo- 
getics. 


b.  THE  SOUECES  OF  THE  KNOWLEDGE  THAT  ACCRUES  TO 
CHRISTIAN  FAITH  AND  DOGMATICS. 

a.  The  Sacred  Scriptures. 

§31.  Exposition  and  Appreciation  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Doc- 
trine of  Inspiration. 

1.  If,  according  to  §28,  faith-knowledge,  and  according  to 
§29,  Christian  dogmatics  rest  on  the  understanding  accruing 
to  faith  of  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ,  the  question 
arises  as  to  the  source  from  which  this  knowledge  is  to  be 
drawn.     The    Sacred    Scriptures   present   themselves   as   such 
source,  but  in  what  sense  ? 

2.  The  orthodox  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the  Scriptures  af- 
firms their   inerrancy.     In   this   assumption   it  is   dominated 
by  a  definite  view  of  the  origin  of  the  Scriptures,  that  is  to 
say,  that  the  Scriptures  originated  from  inspiration,     (a)   The 
inspiration-concept  is  itself  implicated  in  the  doctrine  of  in- 
spiration.1    The  definition  of  Scriptures  and  of  the  properties 
(affectiones)   belonging  to  the  Scriptures  are  intimately  con- 
nected  therewith,     (b)   The   whole    doctrine   is    based   essen- 
tially on  the  "  inner  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit  "  (testimonium 
Spiritius  Sancti  intemum).     (c)   The  rules  for  the  employ- 
ment of  Sacred  Scriptures  in  Christian  dogmatics  are  deduced 
from  the  inspiration  doctrine. 

Note  to  §31 :  2 

1.  There  have  been  many  attempts  to  change  the  inspiration- 
concept  without  changing  the  inspiration-doctrine.  This  marks  the 
beginning  of  the  downfall  of  orthodoxy. 

3.  The  religious  motives  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  in- 
spiration  emerge   most   clearly   in   view   of   the   testimonium 
Spiritus  Sancti,  and  they  are  especially  understandable  against 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     61 

the  background  of  the  conflict  with  the  Catholic  Church  on  the 
one  hand,  and  with  what  was  called  at  the  time  Schwarmer 
(fanatical  sects)  on  the  other.1  But  critical  questions  have 
arisen,  first  as  to  2  (b)  above,  that  is,  the  question  whether  the 
inner  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit  suffices;  (a)  whether  that 
inner  witness  equally  includes  the  entire  Scriptures,  and  (/8) 
whether  it  can  extend  also  to  the  mode  of  the  origin  of  the 
Scriptures ;  secondly,  as  to  2  (a)  above,  the  question  as  to 
whether  the  doctrine  of  the  witness  of  the  Spirit  corresponds 
to  the  given  facts  in  the  case  as  regards  the  Sacred  Scriptures, 
viz.,  (a)  the  actual  character  of  the  Scriptures,  and  (J3)  the 
explicit  testimony  as  to  the  human  source  of  the  Sacred  Scrip- 
tures. From  these  two  points  it  follows  that  the  old  inspira- 
tion-doctrine has  the  character  of  a  postulate,  (a)  which  as 
such  is  neither  to  be  derived  from  the  revelation  of  God  in 
Jesus  Christ,  nor  to  be  harmonized  with  the  character  of  Chris- 
tianity, and  (b)  which  in  addition  does  not  at  all  satisfy  the 
end  which  it  seeks  to  serve.  From  this  it  follows  as  to  2  (c) 
above,  that  the  use  of  Scripture  based  on  this  inspiration- 
doctrine  has  only  the  appearance  of  fidelity  to  the  Scriptures, 
but  in  truth  does  violence  to  them.2 

Notes  to  §31 : 3 

1.  The  inspiration  dogma  was  originally  gotten  out  by  the  Protes- 
tant State  Church  as  a  deadly  instrument  against  the  Roman  Catho- 
lics and  the  Anabaptists.     The  Baptists  have  taken  up  what  was 
originally  a  club  to  break  their  own  heads. 

2.  See    Sabatier:     Religions    of    Authority,    and    G.    B.    Foster: 
Finality  of  the  Christian  Religion,  chs.  Ill,  IV. 

4.  Therefore  that  view  of  the  Sacred  Scriptures  needs  re- 
construction, both  on  the  basis  of  historical  fact  and  on  the 
basis  of  the  Christian  revelation-faith.  The  question  is,  (a) 
How  far  does  the  historical  judgment  concerning  the  Scrip- 
tures lead  (v.  §32)  ?  (b)  On  the  basis  of  the  Christian  reve- 
lation-faith what  is  to  be  said  concerning  the  importance  and 
origin  of  the  Sacred  Scriptures  (v.  §33)  ?  (c)  What  prin- 
ciples flow  therefrom  for  Christian  dogmatics  and  its  employ- 
ment of  the  Sacred  Scriptures  ? 


62     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

§32.  Historical  Judgment  concerning  the  Importance  and  the 
Origin  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  Collection  of  Writ- 
ings. 

1.  With  reference  to  the  New  Testament  writings,  this  much 
may  be  established  as  historical  fact:     (a)   The  New  Testa- 
ment canon,  once  formed,  has  been  of  fundamental  importance 
for  the  entire  further  history  of  the  Christian  Church.     This 
is  true  with  reference  to  the  faith  and  the  life  both  of  the 
individual  and  of  the  community.     On  the  one  hand  (a)  the 
New  Testament  as  a  conservative  force  has  insured  the  con- 
nection and  continuity  of  the  Church  with  the  proclamation 
(KijpirjTwi)    of  Jesus  Christ  which  founded  it.     On  the  other 
hand  (£)  the  New  Testament  as  progressive  force  has  been  a 
determining  influence  in  every  rejuvenation  of  faith  on  the 
part  of  the  Church,     (b)   With  the  fixation  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament canon,  in  spite  of  all  fluctuations  and  aberrations  con- 
cerning the  apostolic  character  of  single  writings,  there  has 
yet  arisen  a  collection  of  books  which  gives  us  original  informa- 
tion concerning  the  witness  to  Jesus  Christ  which  founded  the 
Christian  Church,  a  witness,   moreover,   which  is  not  essen- 
tially corrupted  by  an  alien  spirit.     As  regards  the  latter,  the 
boundary  which  was  drawn  between  the  New  Testament  writ- 
ings and  other  Christian  literature  is  unassailable,  at  least  to 
the  extent  that  no  further  old  Christian  writing  has  an  estab- 
lished claim  to  articulation  in  the  New  Testament  canon,     (c) 
Moreover,  the  composition  of  single  writings  themselves  has 
issued  from  the  original  power  of  the  new  religious  life  pro- 
ceeding from  Jesus  Christ. 

2.  And  as  to  the  Old  Testament,  this  much  is  true:     (a) 
Christianity  became  an  historical  power  only  in  its  connection 
with  the  Old  Testament  writings,  and  the  Christian  view  of 
faith  has  worked  itself  out  into  clearness  only  with  the  aid 
of  the  Old  Testament,  partly  under  the  positive  influence  of 
the  Old  Testament,  partly  in  the  criticism  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment,    (b)  With   the  fixation   of  the   Old   Testament  canon 
which  the   Christian  church  took  over  from  the  synagogue, 
all  the  extant  classic  monuments  of  the  development  of  the 
Old  Testament  religion  have  found  reception  in  the  Church, 
(c)  The  origin  of  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures  is  to  be  ex- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     63 

plained  for  the  most  part  religiously.  That  origin  is  either 
to  be  referred  directly  to  the  prophetic  spirit  announcing  it- 
self in  Israel,  or  it  issued  indirectly  from  the  faith  (created 
by  that  Spirit)  in  the  disclosures  of  God  in  the  outer  history 
and  in  the  legislation  of  Israel. 

§33.  The  Judgment  of  Christian  Faith  Concerning  the  Im- 
portance and  Origin  of  Sacred  Scriptures. 

1.  The  Christian's  judgment  of  faith  does  not  merge  into 
the  historico-scientific  judgment,  but  it  has  its  self-dependent 
certainty,  independently  of  scientific  inquiry.  It  even  puts 
into  a  religious  life  that  which  is  to  be  historically  established, 
and  the  judgment  of  faith  answers  the  question,  In  what 
sense  are  the  Scriptures  Word  of  God?  According  to  §§25, 
27,  only  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ  is  Word  of  God  to  us  in 
an  original  manner.  It  is  to  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus 
Christ  which  is  concentrated  in  his  earthly  person,  but  pre- 
pared for  in  history  and  unfolded  in  the  disclosure  of  the 
Exalted  One,  that  the  original  properties  (affectiones)  belong, 
which  the  church  doctrine  ascribed  to  the  Scripture,  viz. 
auctoritas,  sufficientia,  perspicuitas,  efficacia.  But  in  a  deriva- 
tive manner  every  witness  which  makes  known  to  us  the  God 
revealed  in  Jesus  Christ  and  awakens  faith  in  Jesus  Christ 
becomes  God's  Word  to  us. 

2.  Among  these  witnesses  the  New  Testament  occupies  an 
entirely  singular  position,  (a)  It  is  only  through  its  media- 
tion that  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  is  still  to-day 
accessible  to  us  in  its  original  power  and  fulness.  And  of 
course  this  depends  upon  the  connection  given  in  the  New 
Testament  between  the  narrative  concerning  Jesus  Christ  and 
the  fundamental  witness  of  faith  concerning  him.  This  worth 
of  the  New  Testament  as  fundamental  witness  of  God's  revela- 
tion in  Jesus  Christ  is  abiding  to  the  single  Christian's  con- 
viction and  experience  of  faith,  and  its  worth  is  powerfully 
corroborated  by  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church  (v.  §32: 1, 
a),  (b)  In  the  fulfilment  of  this  task  of  ascertaining  the 
original  revelation  of  God,  the  New  Testament,  taken  as 
a  whole,  has  the  properties  stated  in  1  above.  But  its  single 
parts  are  not  of  equal  worth.  Its  gradedness  becomes  evident 


64     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

if  one  asks  more  definitely,  (a)  how  far  its  content  directly 
presents  the  gospel,  or  is  only  indirectly  related  thereto,  and 
(£)  how  lofty  is  the  understanding  of  Jesus  Christ  by  faith 
which  is  deposited  in  it,  how  far  it  sets  forth  Christ.  The 
single  factors  of  the  New  Testament  are  therefore  Word  of 
God  only  in  the  degree  that  they  proffer  us  the  living  Word 
of  God  in  Jesus  Christ. 

3.  There  is  a  corresponding  witness  of  the  Christian  faith 
and  Christian  experience  in  the  Old  Testament.     That  is  (a) 
through  the  Old  Testament  mediation  the  preliminary  revela- 
tion of  God  in  Israel  exercises  on  Christians  and  Christianity 
its  pedagogic  efficacy,      (b)  But  the  properties    (affectiones) 
designated  above  do  not  belong  to  the  Old  Testament  by  itself 
alone,  but  only  when  it  is  understood  in  connection  with  the 
New  Testament,     (c)  Also  the  diversity  of  value  of  single 
parts  of  the  Old  Testament  is  much  greater  than  in  the  New. 

4.  Now  it  is  from  the  faith  in  the  significance  of  the  Sacred 
Scriptures  that  judgments  of  faith  follow  concerning  the  origin 
of  Sacred  Scriptures,  judgments  which  articulate  the  historical 
fund  in  the  system  of  Christian  faith,      (a)  As  to  the  origin 
of  the  New  Testament  writings  it  is  true  that  they  have  not 
arisen  through  real  or  verbal  inspiration.     Still  they  are  the 
work,  or  product,  or  fruit,  of  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 
therewith  of  the  Spirit  of  God  which  has  informed  the  New 
Testament  witness  in  its  entire  personal  life,  and  therefore  also 
pervaded  its  literary  activity.     This  "  inspiration  of  person  " 
is  not  qualitatively  different  from  the  Spirit-produced  illumi- 
nation of  all  believers;   rather  the  outstanding  position   and 
significance   of   New   Testament  authors   is   founded,   not  on 
their  "  inspiration,"  but  on  their  special  vocation,  leadership 
and  endowment.     The  judgment  of  faith  concerning  the  com- 
position of  the  Old  Testament  is  analogous   (cf.    §32:2,  c). 
Old  Testament  writings  are  directly  or  indirectly  a  work  of 
the  Spirit  of  God  operative  in  Old  Testament  prophecy  and 
in  the  guidance  of  the  people,      (b)   In  addition  we  judge  in 
faith  with  reference  to  the  fixation  of  the  two  canonical  collec- 
tions of  writings.     Both  the  formation  of  the  New  Testament 
canon  (v.  §32 : 1,  b)   and  the  taking  over  of  the  Old  Testa- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHKISTIAN  DOGMATICS     65 

merit  canon  (v.  §32:2,  b)  took  place  under  the  guidance  of  the 
Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ. 

§34.  The  Principles  Guiding  the  Employment  of  Sacred  Scrip- 
ture in  Christian  Dogmatics. 

1.  Since,  according  to  §33:  2,  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus 
Christ  is  accessible  to  us  in  its  originality  only  through  the 
Scriptures,  there  must  be  a  scriptural  proof  for  every  propo- 
sition in  Christian  dogmatics;  but  a  proposition  is  not  scrip- 
tural because  passages  can  be  quoted  in  its  support.  It  is 
scriptural  because  it  issues  with  inner  necessity  or  conse- 
quentialness  from  believing  surrender  to  the  revelation  of  God 
to  which  the  Scriptures  bear  witness.1 

Note  to  §34:1 

1.  No  religious  teaching  of  the  Bible  can  be  immediately  trans- 
ferred into  dogmatics.     The  conceptual  machinery  of  the  Biblical 
writers  had  a  functional  reality  to  them;  are  you  on  that  account 
going  to  give  to  these  concepts  an  ontological  reality?     Is  the  form 
of  culture  of  a  particular  time  to  be  erected  into  eternal  validity  ? 

2.  The  material  for  dogmatics  cannot  be  obtained  from  the 
Scriptures  by  purely  exegetical,  historical  investigation,     (a) 
To  be  sure,  the  exegetical,  historical  work  is  indispensable 
for  the  dogmatic  employment  of  Sacred   Scripture;   in  par- 
ticular the  so-called  New  Testament  theology  directly  yields 
basis  for  the  dogmatic  employment  of  Sacred  Scripture,  since 
it  seeks  to  understand  Jesus'  proclamation  as  well  as  the  wit- 
ness of  faith  on  the  part  of  primitive  Christianity  in  their 
actual  historical  meaning  and  connection.     But  New  Testa- 
ment theology  yields,  as  such,  no  Christian  dogmatics,  even 
though  New  Testament  theology  does  endeavor  (a)  to  appre- 
hend the  living  religious  witness  with   conceptual  clearness, 
(j8)  to  shell  out  the  spiritual  content  from  the  thought-forms 
of  the  time,   and    (y)    to  investigate  the  inner  unity  in  the 
multiplicity  of  witness,     (b)   Dogmatics  seeks  not  only  to  un- 
derstand what  is  given  in  the  New  Testament  in  its  historical 
actuality,  but  to  win  a  judgment  concerning  some  other  mat- 
ters, viz.   (a)  with  what  right  and  in  what  scope  faith  may 


66     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

and  must  recognize  a  real  revelation  of  God  in  what  is  nar- 
rated concerning  Jesus  Christ,  and  (ft)  how  correct  was  the 
understanding  of  the  revelation  on  the  part  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment witnesses.1 

Note  to  §34 :  2 

1.  In  dogmatics  one  must  steer  clear  of  the  philosophical  on  the 
one  side  and  the  merely  historical  on  the  other. 

3.  This  dogmatic  employment  of  Sacred  Scripture  must  be 
guided  by  the  following  points  of  view:  (a)  In  the  light  of 
the  New  Testament  narrative  concerning  Jesus  Christ,  dog- 
matics, commencing  with  the  earthly  form  of  Jesus  (v.  §26 :  1) 
and  with  his  word  and  work  (v.  §26:2),  has  to  propound 
the  question  as  to  what  in  this  Jesus  Christ  can  and  should 
become  to  us  an  object  of  the  certainty  and  obedience  of  faith 
by  virtue  of  its  being  a  salvation-bringing  revelation  of  God. 
(b)  In  the  New  Testament  witness  of  faith  in  Jesus  Christ, 
dogmatics  finds  introduction  to  the  understanding  and  un- 
folding of  the  revelation  given  in  him.  But  still  the  New  Tes- 
tament witness  of  faith  must  itself  be  tested  by  Jesus'  word, 
work  and  life,  and  hence  the  following  questions  must  be 
raised  as  to  that  witness:  (a)  What  is  actually  witness  of 
faith  in  Jesus  Christ  in  this  witness,  and  what  on  the  other 
hand  springs  from  another  and  different  source  of  knowledge, 
perhaps  from  the  picture  of  the  world  of  the  time?  What  is 
direct  presentation  of  the  experienced  reality  of  faith,  and 
what  is  perhaps  an  attempt  at  speculative  explanation  of  that 
which  is  believed?  (/?)  In  what  degree  is  a  faithful  and  full 
understanding  of  the  phenomenon  of  Jesus  Christ  discernible 
in  the  New  Testament,  given  in  that  which  is  actually  a  wit- 
ness of  faith  ?  In  other  words,  how  far  does  that  witness  of 
faith  really  set  forth  Jesus  Christ  ?  What  is  common  to  all 
the  witness,  and  how  far,  on  the  other  hand,  does  the  individ- 
ual witness,  e.  g.  the  Pauline,  show  itself  to  be  especially 
adapted  to  disclose,  to  enrich,  to  ensure  against  false  appre- 
hensions faith's  understanding  of  Jesus  Christ?  (y)  How  far 
is  the  form  of  expression,  in  the  faithful  presentation  of  that 
which  is  believed,  to  be  considered  universally  valid,  and  how 
far  significant  only  for  that  time  ? 1  (c)  As  regards  Old  Tes- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     67 

tament  use,  dogmatics  has  to  apply  everywhere  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  criterion,  asking,  How  far  does  the  Old  Testament 
approximate  the  heights  of  the  New  Testament  knowledge  that 
accrues  to  faith  ? 

Note  to  §34 :  3 

1.  Paul  conquered  with  the  cosmic  Messiah,  not  with  the  historic 
Jesus.  Can  religion  do  without  mythology?  Can  we  conquer  with 
the  plain,  simple  categories  of  forgiveness,  humility,  righteousness, 
etc.?  The  great  Messianic  concept  was  the  functional  reality  with 
which  the  primitive  church  conquered.  They  regarded  it  as  onto- 
logical  reality,  but  today  we  see  that  it  was  only  machinery,  and  we 
put  it  aside  as  unusable  by  us,  much  as  we  put  aside  the  old  reap- 
hook  in  harvest,  and  use  the  modern  binder.  But  is  it  not  of  the  na- 
ture of  religion  to  messianize  its  reality,  and  must  we  not  yet  do  that 
same  thing?  (See  Gunkel's  work  on  Genesis.) 

The  other  alternative  is  to  take  up  the  idea  of  organizing  our  ap- 
petites and  passions,  our  impulses  and  instincts  into  a  whole  of  per- 
sonality, keying  ourselves  closer  together  in  the  social  whole,  and 
using  scientific  and  sociological  conceptions,  and  to  set  up  this  as  our 
salvation  from  sin  and  death  and  hell.  There  is  nothing  strange 
about  this  idea  of  maturing  personality;  no  great  historical  facts  of 
other-world  significance  are  necessary.  There  is  no  poetry;  all  is 
plain  prose,  rational,  very  rational,  almost  rationalistic. 

But  it  was  the  drama  that  did  the  work,  not  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount.  It  is  character  by  salvation  that  appeals  to  the  man  in  the 
slums,  not  salvation  by  character. 

(3.  The  Doctrine  of  the  Church. 

§35.  The  Importance  of  the  Development  of  Christian  Doc- 
trine in  General  for  Our  Faith-Knowledge  and  for  Dog- 
matics. 

1.  The  thesis  that  the  knowledge  of  the  regulative  revela- 
tion of  God  is  to  be  drawn  from  the  Sacred  Scriptures  alone 
is  contested  by  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  The  latter  main- 
tains that  it  possesses  not  only  a  supplement  to  the  material 
of  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  but  also  an  infallible  guide  for  their 
correct  interpretation  in  the  ecclesiastical  tradition  controlled 
by  the  teaching  office  of  the  Church,  and  it  bases  this  assertion 
on  the  assumption  of  episcopal  succession,  but  primarily  on 
the  postulate  of  faith  of  an  infallible  divine  guidance  of  the 
Church  in  her  doctrines  and  institutions.  On  the  evangelical 


68      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

side  (a)  that  assumption  is  rightly  rejected  as  an  unhistorical 
fiction,  and  (b)  this  postulate  of  faith  as  a  conclusion  from 
a  false  conception  of  revelation. 

2.  For  the  real  character  of  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus 
Christ  assigns  to  Christianity  the  task  of  gaining  the  content 
of  that  revelation  from  the  Sacred   Scriptures  by  means  of 
common   labor   on   the    Scriptures.     A   gradually   profounder 
and  richer  appropriation  of  that  content  can  take  place  only 
in  the  experiences  of  life,  and  in  the  great  movements  of  his- 
tory through  the  conflicts  of  the  spirit  under  the  influences  of 
great  personalities.     But   under  these  circumstances  the   de- 
velopment is  not  ortholinear.     It  passes  through  manifold  in- 
dividual formations,  fluctuations  and  regresses. 

3.  It  is  from  every  positive  contribution  of  this  develop- 
ment of  doctrine  and  of  life  as  it  is  presented  in  the  life  of 
the  Christian  community  and  deposited  in   Christian  educa- 
tion and  instruction,  that  faith  derives  its  guidance  to  the 
understanding  and  to  the  practical  appropriation  of  the  revela- 
tion of  God.     Of  course  this  development  of  doctrine  and  of 
life,  when  it  has  itself  taken  false  paths,  can  also  lead  indi- 
viduals astray ;  therefore  access  to  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  and 
thereby  to  the  original  revelation  of  God,  is  to  be  kept  open 
and  free  to  the  practical  knowledge  that  accrues  to  Christian 
faith. 

4.  It  is  only  in  connection  with  the   advancement  of  the 
practical  knowledge  that   accrues   to  faith  that  progress  can 
be  made  in  scientific  dogmatics  (v.  §29),  and  of  course  scien- 
tific dogmatics,  in  its  methodic  reflection  and  criticism,  has  to 
borrow  indices  to  a  correct  understanding  of  the  subject  from 
the  development  of  doctrine  and  of  life  in  the  past  on  the 
one  hand ;  and  on  the  other  hand  it  has  to  recognize  the  by- 
ways of  error  and  of  danger  from  which  we  must  save  our- 
selves. 

§36.  The  Importance  of  the  Reformation  Understanding  of 
Salvation  for  the  Knowledge  which  Accrues  to  Faith  and 
for  Dogmatics. 

1.  As  evangelical   Christians  we  hold   the  Reformation   to 
be  the  most  important  epoch  in  the  development  of  the  doctrine 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     69 

and  life  of  the  Church.  In  the  Eastern  Church  the  gospel 
of  salvation  appearing  in  Jesus  Christ  was  coined  into  Gnosis 
(yvwo-w)  and  cult  mysticism  (corresponding  to  the  Greek 
spirit),  by  means  of  which  the  liberation  from  corruptibleness 
(or  mortality)  to  incorruptibleness  (or  immortality)  was  said 
to  be  mediated.1  In  the  Roman  Church  something  of  an  eth- 
ical conception  of  Christianity  was  indeed  preserved,  but  in 
legal,  civic  distortion  of  the  gospel.  Salvation  was  bound 
down  to  a  hierarchically  constituted  Church.2  The  latter  fur- 
nished (a)  supernatural  doctrines  of  truth  and  commandments 
of  life,  and  (b)  sacramental  powers  of  grace,  through  the 
obedient  reception  of  which  (a  and  b  above)  the  faithful  mem- 
bers of  the  Church  were  said  to  be  enabled  to  good  works  and 
to  the  acquiring  of  eternal  life.  As  against  all  this,  in  the 
Reformation  the  gospel  of  the  sin-forgiving  grace  of  God  be- 
stowed upon  us  in  Jesus  Christ  was  put  in  the  center.  It 
called  every  individual  to  the  independent  personal  appropria- 
tion by  faith  of  this  gospel  to  which  the  Sacred  Scriptures 
witnessed,  and  which  was  entrusted  to  the  community  of  faith ; 
and  it  did  so  in  the  conviction  that  this  personal  appropriation 
of  faith  also  produces  a  life  in  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 
on  that  account  in  the  kingdom  of  God.  With  this  life  also 
there  was  blessedness.3 

Notes  to  §36 : 1 

1.  The  true  place  for  a  gospel  which  has  immortality  as  its  central 
fact  is  in  Greek  Catholicism,  not  in  Protestantism. 

2.  See  Kaftan's  Truth  of  the  Christian  Religion,  Vol.  I,  and  Har- 
nack's  History  of  Dogma  and  What  is  Christianity? 

3.  In  the  Reformation  we  see  the  beginning  of  moral  individualism 
and  autonomy  under  God,  as  opposed  to  institutionalism  and  heteron- 
omy.     There  is  a  getting  away  from  the  ecclesiastical  man  to  a  human 
man,  religious,  moral  and  intellectual;  from  the  externality  of  ec- 
clesiasticism  to  the  internality  of  the  moral  and  religious  man. 

2.  According  to  our  evangelical  judgment  this  reformation 
understanding  of  salvation  is  no  quantitative  supplementing 
nor  qualitative  transcending  of  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus 
Christ,  but  only  an  elaboration  of  its  true  content,  on  the 
basis  of  a  profound  penetration  into  the  Scriptures  as  original 
witness  thereof.  Therefore  the  practical  knowledge  which  ac- 


70     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

crues  to  Christian  faith  can  be  derived  from  this  reformation 
understanding  of  salvation  as  it  is  propagated  in  the  evangel- 
ical churches  in  various  degrees ;  but  in  the  sense  that  this 
knowledge  led  an  independent  derivation  from  the  Scriptures, 
evangelical  dogmatics  finds  a  guide  here,  but  no  legal  restric- 
tion. For  the  evangelical  church  doctrine  seeks  to  contain  the 
reformation  apprehension  of  salvation ;  but  it  has  not  the  char- 
acter of  a  dogma,  exhausting  the  content  of  the  revelation  of 
God,  and  infallible  as  to  form.  Our  judgment  as  to  the  im- 
portance of  the  evangelical  confessional  writings  follows  from 
this. 

§37.  The  Importance  of  Evangelical  Confessions  for  Faith- 
Knowledge  and  for  Dogmatics. 

1.  In  reference  to  the  historical  fact,  (a)  it  is  precisely  the 
oldest  and  most  important  among  the  confessional  writings 
that  were  not  drawn  up  as  doctrinal  law  for  the  evangelical 
churches,  but  (a)  as  public  testimony  of  the  newly  gained 
understanding  of  the  gospel  on  the  part  of  faith,1  and  (ft) 
as  basis  for  controversy,  if  need  be,  with  the  opponents  of  the 
Eeformation.  (b)  The  confessional  writings  were  originally 
nothing  but  witness  to  the  understanding  of  the  Sacred  Scrip- 
tures gained  at  that  time.  They  subjected  themselves,  there- 
fore, simply  to  the  norm  of  Sacred  Scripture.  In  the  later 
confessional  writings  this  was  the  case  also,  so  far  as  a  certain 
presupposition  was  concerned,  viz.  that  not  only  the  gospel 
to  which  they  witnessed,  but  also  the  forma  doctrinae  deposited 
in  them  was  the  only  scriptural  one,  and  therefore  binding  for 
all  time.2  Orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  has  only  refined 
upon  this  judgment. 

Note  to  §37:1 

1.  All  creeds  ought  to  be  primarily  our  testimony,  not  a  test  for 
some  one  else. 

2.  The  main  error  was  in  supposing  that  theological  theory  could 
be  immediately  transferred  from  Scripture  to  dogmatics,  as  of  perma- 
nent normative  validity  for  faith.     It  was  a  pardonable  error  then, 
for  historical  science  was  as  yet  unborn;  but  it  is  an  unpardonable 
error  now. 

2.  The  worth   of  confessional   writings   from   a   consistent 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     71 

evangelical  standpoint  is  to  be  defined  as  follows:  (a)  As 
officially  acknowledged  documentary  witness  of  the  self-formed 
evangelical  churches,  they  are  the  most  important  for  evan- 
gelical dogmatics  among  the  historic  guides  which  show  us 
the  doctrinal  development  of  Christianity  —  most  important 
also  in  part  for  the  practical  evangelical  knowledge  which 
accrues  to  faith.1  The  confessional  writings  have  this  double 
value  all  the  more,  the  more  they  have  the  character  of  re- 
ligious witness,  not  of  theological  doctrinal  exposition,  and  the 
more  they  themselves  present  new  creations  from  the  newly 
gained  understanding  of  the  Scriptures,  (b)  But  it  is  at  the 
same  time  the  absolute  right  of  dogmatics  critically  to  evaluate 
the  confessions  as  human  productions,  and  to  judge  them  by 
the  new  understanding  of  Scripture  and  the  new  experience 
of  life  of  each  new  time. 

Note  to  §37 :  2 

1.  But  distinction  is  to  be  made  between  kernel  and  shell  in  his- 
torical confession,  as  well  as  in  Scripture. 

3.  When  does  a  dogmatic  have  claim  to  the  name  "  ecclesias- 
tical," or  "  confessional  "  ?  (a)  Only  when  on  the  basis  of 
an  independent  investigation  of  Sacred  Scripture,  it  assents 
to  the  one  cardinal  article  common  to  confessional  churches, 
viz.  that  we  have  forgiveness  of  sin  and  eternal  life  through 
faith  in  Jesus  Christ,  (b)  Only  when  on  that  basis  the  dog- 
matics acknowledge  the  practical  religious  view  of  our  confes- 
sions concerning  the  attitude  of  the  Christian  to  God,  to  the 
world,  to  the  Church,  to  the  neighbor,  as  the  correct  revela- 
tion-knowledge. But  on  this  basis  a  progress  of  faith-knowl- 
edge as  to  content  and  a  further  development  of  theological 
form  are  not  only  admissible,  but  obligatory  in  evangelical 
churches. 


c.  THE  METHOD  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS. 
§38.  The  Method  of  the  Orthodox  Ecclesiastical  Dogmatics. 

1.  The  decision  concerning  the  method  of  dogmatics  to  be 
followed  is  implicitly  given  with  the  view  already  presented 
concerning  the  character  and  sources  of  the  knowledge  which 


72     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

accrues  to  faith  and  dogmatics.  But  it  is  necessary  to  define 
the  relation  of  this  method  to  other  methods,  and  first  of  all 
to  that  of  the  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics. 

2.  There  are  four  methodic  elements  combined  in  orthodox 
ecclesiastical  dogmatics,     (a)   The  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dog- 
matics seeks  especially  to  be  Scripture-dogmatics.     Each  doc- 
trinal section  is  said  to  be  borrowed  and  proved  from  the  in- 
spired Scriptures,      (b)   The  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics 
is  traditionrdogmatics,  for  the  Scripture  is  explained  accord- 
ing to  the  analogy  of  faith  (analogia  fidei),  i.  e.,  however,  in 
the  last  analysis,  according  to  the  sum  of  the  articles  of  faith 
acknowledged  as  authoritative  —  partly  of  the  old  church  con- 
fession, partly  of  the  evangelical  confession,     (c)   There  is  a 
speculative  precipitate ;  i.  e.  it  is  speculation-dogmatics.     This 
is  not  only  contained  in  the  dogmas  that  were  taken  over  from 
the  Church,   but   ecclesiastical   dogmatics   has   elaborated   the 
material  gained  according  to  (a)  and  (b)  above  by  means  of 
logical  definitions,  inferences  and  chains  of  reasonings,  into  a 
system  of  doctrine  wherein  that  which  is  believed  is  presented 
in  its  objective  connection  and  proved,  within  certain  limits, 
to  the  reason,     (d)   But  in  one  very  important  point  the  ortho- 
dox ecclesiastical  dogmatics  is  also  the  dogmatics  of  the  Chris- 
tian experience,  viz.  so  far  as  it  bases  its  proof  of  Scriptural 
authority  on  the  testimonium  Sancti  Spiritus  intemum. 

3.  The  right  and  the  wrong  of  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  as  to 
Scripture  and  tradition  follow  from  the  two  preceding  sec- 
tions, and  need  not  be  reproduced  here.     But  with  reference 
to  the  speculation  element  there  is  the  following  objection. 
The  character  of  Christian  knowledge  as  faith-knowledge  in 
distinction  from  science-knowledge  is  obscured  when  the  faith- 
truths  are  viewed,   as  to  their  origin,   as  miraculously  com- 
municated, but  are  treated  in  scientific  exposition  as  objects 
of  theoretical  knowledge.     With  reference  to  the  experience 
element,  the  following  should  be  noted.     Full  right  is  to  be 
accorded  to  the  inner  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  but  it  is  also 
to  be  required  that  the  inner  authorization  of  Christian  truth 
shall  come   to  validity   not  merely   in   this  one  point   which 
orthodoxy  emphasizes,  viz.  as  to  scriptural  authority,  but  in 
every  single  article  of  faith  or  proposition  of  dogmatics.1 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     73 

Note  to  §38 :  3 

1.  Orthodoxy  delimited  its  experience-theology  to  the  authorizing 
of  Sacred  Scripture. 

§39.  The  Various  Methods  of  Modern  Dogmatics. 

1.  After  the  disintegrating  criticism  by  rationalism  the  va- 
rious elements  that  were  externally  and  rather  uncritically 
combined  in  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  fell  apart  of  themselves. 
But  in  more  recent  times  those  very  elements  reappeared  in 
new  combinations,  or  else  in  such  a  way  that  one  of  these 
elements  is  the  leading  one,  and  the  others  contributory,  (a) 
There  is  the  method  of  development  from  the  Christian  con- 
sciousness, and  in  the  case  of  one  system  in  particular,  from 
the  experience  of  regeneration.1  This  method  brought  the 
fourth  element  of  the  orthodox  method  into  prominence.  In 
various  degrees  the  Christian  consciousness  has  been  under- 
stood as  a  consciousness  inwardly  united  with  Sacred  Scrip- 
ture and  church  doctrine.  The  right  of  this  method  is  (a)  its 
rejection  of  a  legalistic  employment  of  Sacred  Scripture  and 
church  doctrine,  and  (ft)  its  rejection  of  the  treatment  of  the 
world  of  faith  as  object  of  purely  objective,  theoretical  knowl- 
edge. The  danger  of  this  method  is  (a)  the  overgrowth  of 
subjectivity,  and  (ft)  unclearness  concerning  the  relation  of 
subjective  faith  to  its  historical  basis  and  to  the  ecclesiastical 
development  of  Christianity,  (b)  The  speculative  method  un- 
folds the  element  mentioned  above  in  §38:2,  c.  By  indicat- 
ing a  necessary  progress  of  thought,  it  seeks  (a)  either  to 
develop  the  entire  Christian  dogmatics  according  to  its  ra- 
tional content  of  thought,  or  (ft)  at  least  to  develop  all  the 
rest  of  Christian  truth  from  the  basis  of  a  certain  central 
position  of  faith.  This  is  done  partly  in  philosophical  inter- 
est mainly,  partly  in  theological  interest  mainly,  now  in  a 
critical  and  now  in  an  ecclesiastical  spirit.2  The  right  of  this 
method  is  the  idea  of  (a.)  the  rationality  and  (ft)  the  inner 
unity  of  the  Christian  faith.3  But  since  it  hopes  to  prove 
both  the  rationality  and  inner  unity  in  a  dialectical,  logical 
way,  it  dangerously  tends  to  convert  our  faith-knowledge  into 
gnosis,  and  fails  to  do  justice  to  the  full  import  of  revela- 
tion.4 (c)  The  confessionalistic  method  (v.  §38:2,  b)  takes 


74     CHKISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

its  standpoint  in  ecclesiastical  confession.  It  seeks  to  estab- 
lish this  confession,  or  to  preserve  it  as  a  living  power,  by 
"organic  development."  Its  right  is  that  it  emphasizes  the 
worth  of  ecclesiastical  doctrine  for  dogmatics.5  But  on  the 
other  hand  its  wrong  may  be  pointed  out.  So  far  as  it  seeks 
only  the  repristination  of  ecclesiastical  doctrine,  this  method 
falls  under  the  condemnation  of  unhistoricalness.  But  so 
far  as  it  seeks  re-establishment  and  development  of  ecclesiastical 
doctrine,  it  must  enter  into  compact  with  other  methods,  e.  g. 
with  the  dogmatics  of  the  Christian  consciousness,  or  with  the 
speculative  method,  or  with  both,  (d)  The  Biblicistic  method 
(v.  §38:2,  a)  is  guided  by  the  principle  that  Scripture  doc- 
trine, and  of  course  the  whole  Scripture  doctrine,  must  form 
the  material  of  Christian  dogmatics.  Its  right  is  on  the  one 
hand  (a)  its  penetration  into  the  Scripture  thought;  on  the 
other  hand  (ft)  its  liberation  from  an  outward  ecclesiastical 
doctrinal  law,  as  well  as  (y)  the  endeavor  to  be  free  from 
merely  subjective  experience  and  (8)  from  philosophical  spec- 
ulation. Its  defect  is  (a)  its  under-estimation  of  the  ecclesias- 
tical doctrinal  development,  and  (ft)  its  unhistorical  appre- 
hension of  Scripture,  which,  in  order  to  get  a  Biblical  doc- 
trinal system  out  of  the  Scriptures,  must  do  violence  to  the 
Scriptures,  and  yet  again  recur  to  speculation  or  to  Christian 
experience.  In  this  discussion  (from  a  to  d)  various  combi- 
nations are  indicated.  Rich  in  such  performances  or  taking 
its  point  of  departure  mostly  from  (a)  above,  is  especially  the 
so-called  mediating  theology.6 

Notes  to  §39 : 1 

1.  See  F.  H.  R.  Frank's  System  of  Christian  Certainty  and  System 
of  Christian  Truth. 

2.  Hegel  in  an  ecclesiastical  spirit;  Baur  and  Strauss  in  a  critical 
spirit. 

3.  Pfleiderer  stands  for  the  rationality  and  inner  unity  of  Chris- 
tian faith.     On  the  other  hand  Kaftan  says  it  makes  no  difference 
with  what  proposition  we  begin  in  dogmatics,  thus  jeopardizing  the 
Christian  conviction  of  the  inner  unity  of  the  Christian  faith. 

4.  There  is  more  in  rationality  than  what  can  be  got  at  dialectically 
and  logically.     Its  inner  unity  centers  not  in  the  intellectual  side, 
but  in  the  moral  disposition  of  the  will. 

§.  No  irreverent  and  violent  breach  with  the  past  is  scientific.. 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     75 

6.  Beginning  with  Schleiermacher,  and  developing  into  radicalism 
in  some  instances,  and  into  a  repristination  of  orthodoxy  in  others. 

2.  The  mediating  theology  sought  after  a  higher  unity  of 
the  methods  already  mentioned,  but  did  not  really  attain  it. 
In  more  recent  times  the  way  has  been  to  pass  back  from  Chris- 
tian consciousness  and  church  doctrine  to  the  Scriptures,  and 
within  the  Scriptures  themselves  to  pass  on  to  the  living  reve- 
lation of  God  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  on  that  basis  to  develop  in 
Christocentric  treatment  all  Christian  doctrine,  not  specula- 
tively  but  as  faith's  understanding  of  revelation.1  (a)  In 
this  way  on  the  one  side  (Ritschl)  within  the  revelation  regu- 
lative for  faith  it  is  the  proclamation  in  word  and  deed  of 
Jesus  himself  that  becomes  the  central  norm  according  to  which 
dogmatics,  employing  the  N.  T.  witness  of  faith,  and  leaning 
upon  the  Reformation  ecclesiastical  confessions  has  to  con- 
struct the  unitary  religious  view  of  the  Christian  community 
concerning  God,  the  world  and  life,  (b)  Other  dogmaticians 
set  out  in  a  somewhat  different  way;  for  them  the  scriptural 
material  and  church  doctrine  are  to  be  evaluated  and  the  en- 
tire dogmatics  drawn  up  on  the  basis  of  the  fundamental  reli- 
gious experience  of  God's  justifying  gift  of  himself  in  Jesus 
Christ.  But  these  dogmaticians  emphasize  (v.  §26:1)  the 
self-revelation  of  God  in  the  whole  Biblical  Christ,  instead  of 
simply  making  the  earthly  Jesus  prominent.  Thus  they  keep 
closer  to  the  line  of  the  Biblicistic  method  from  which  they 
set  out.2 

Notes  to  §39 :  2 

1.  This  is  the  method  of  Kaftan,  Schultz,  Reischle,  Troeltsch,  Herr- 
mann, Harnack,  and  of  the  modern  younger  theologians  of  our  own 
country.  It  will  stay  so  long  as  Jesus  Christ  is  the  center  of  our 
religion  and  revelation.  If  he  fails  to  maintain  that  central  place, 
this  method  will  go  by.  But  in  that  case  dogmatics  will  go,  and  we 
shall  have  only  philosophy  and  psychology  of  religion. 

The  religio-historical  movement  is  rubbing  out  the  line  of  peculi- 
arity in  Christ.  We  are  in  a  real  crisis  —  a  terrible  one.  Wrede 
quotes  a  note  from  one  of  the  ecclesiastical  newspapers  in  Germany 
which  says  that  the  religio-historical  movement  means  war;  for  if 
the  gospel  as  they  understand  it  is  preached,  the  church  is  overcome 
and  perishes  as  church;  it  will  be  the  end  of  ecclesiastical  religion. 

For  example,   the  new  view   claims   that   the  difference   between 


76     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

James  and  Paul  is  greater  than  the  difference  between  Jesus  and  the 
pious  Jews  of  his  day.  They  claim  that  the  whole  theological, 
Messianic  interpretation  of  Jesus  must  be  stripped  off,  and  he  be 
just  man;  that  whereas  the  old  view  put  Jesus  over  against  man, 
we  must  now  put  him  in  the  human  category  entirely;  the  attitude 
one  takes  toward  the  question  of  the  divinity  of  Jesus  will  depend 
upon  one's  philosophy,  and  will  correspond  with  one's  valuation  of 
man,  the  difference  being  one  of  degree  only. 

If  this  religio-historical  movement  is  mere  historical  science,  giving 
facts  and  relations,  but  no  value- judgments,  there  is  left  room  for 
the  value-judgment  of  dogmatics.  If  not,  there  would  seem  to  be 
no  place  left  for  dogmatics.  And  it  is  hard  for  men  to  give  to 
science  only  what  belongs  to  science,  and  not  to  add  value- judgments 
and  philosophical  interpretation. 

Does  the  surrender  of  discontinuity  in  religious  experience  ex- 
clude the  possibility  of  the  supremely  worthful?  Are  the  supremely 
worthful  and  the  causal  incompatible?  There  will  be  no  solution 
of  this  problem  till  all  the  historical  material  is  given  over  to  the 
philosophy  and  psychology  of  religion. 

2.  As  the  Ritschlians  say,  the  revelation  which  comes  to  us  through 
Jesus  Christ  comes  from  his  earthly  career  alone.  What  vocation  in 
the  world  has  the  Jesus  of  today  —  the  super-earthly  Jesus  ?  None. 
God  alone  is  all  in  all.  But  God  is  the  God  whom  we  know  in  and 
through  the  earthly  Jesus.  The  value  of  Jesus  for  religion  is  the 
significance  of  his  earthly  life  as  indicating  the  kind  of  God  there  is. 
Yet  the  modern  theologian  believes  in  Jesus'  immortality,  because  the 
kind  of  God  who  is  revealed  in  Jesus  would  not  snuff  out  the  object 
of  his  love,  such  as  Jesus  was. 


§40.  Comprehensive  and  Constructive  Statement  of  the  Dog- 
matic Method. 

1.  According  to  the  view  developed  concerning  revelation 
(§§25-27),  concerning  the  character  of  faith-knowledge  and 
science-knowledge  (§§28-30),  and  concerning  the  importance 
of  Sacred  Scripture  and  the  ecclesiastical  doctrinal  develop- 
ment (§§31-37),  the  method  of  faith's  understanding  of  reve- 
lation (sketched  in  §39:  3)  and  hence  the  Christocentric  treat- 
ment of  dogmatics,  although  not  the  basis  of  dogmatics,  seems 
to  have  the  most  to  commend  it.  Any  deviation  from  this 
method  is  to  be  gained  by  a  clearer  understanding  of  the  two 
expressions,  "  revelation  "  and  "  the  understanding  which  ac- 
crues to  faith."  (a)  In  line  with  §39:2  (a)  above,  and  in 
opposition  to  §39 :  2  (b)  above,  in  dogmatic  work  we  have  to 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     77 

lay  hold  of  the  earthly  person  and  work  of  the  Savior,  Jesus 
Christ,  as  the  center  of  the  whole  revelation  of  God  and  as  the 
starting-point  of  the  independent  certainty  of  faith  and  the 
inner  understanding  of  faith  (cf.  §26).1  But  instead  of  this 
hindering,  it  should  help  us  to  employ  the  whole  revelation 
of  God  (as  against  the  Ritschlians),  concentrated  in  that  cen- 
ter indeed,  in  the  dogmatic  development  of  the  propositions 
of  Christian  faith,  and  thereby  to  preserve  vital  connection 
with  the  witnesses  of  the  New  Testament  community.  Thus 
there  is  truth  also  in  the  revelation-dogmatics  allied  to  Bibli- 
cism.  (b)  But  scientific  dogmatics  cannot  develop  the  con- 
tent of  revelation  in  a  purely  objective  historical  fixation.  It 
cannot  be  satisfied  simply  to  indicate  that  this  or  that  religious 
view  of  God,  world  and  life  occupies  an  essential  place  in  the 
proclamation  of  Jesus,  or  in  the  circle  of  thought  of  the  apostles. 
Rather  on  the  basis  of  methodic  reflection  it  must  show,  in  the 
case  of  every  single  proposition  of  faith,  how  we  may  become 
aware  of  the  spiritual  reality  expressed  in  that  proposition; 
how  we  may  become  aware  of  it  by  personal  faith  in  God's 
revelation,  and  therefore  become  able  to  expound  that  reality 
in  judgments  of  faith  (cf.  §29). 

Note  to  §40 : 1 

1.  Everything  depends   for  dogmatics   and   the  church   upon   the 
permanent  validity  of  the  above  statement.     It  is  difficult  enough  to 
give  up  the  centrality  of  the  pre-existent  and  post-existent  Christ. 
But  if  the  centrality  of  the  earthly  Christ  were  given  up,  our  religion 
would  no  longer  be  necessarily  called  Christian. 

The  concatenations  of  Jesus  with  historical,  developmental  factors 
do  not  necessarily  destroy  his  significance  and  validity  for  life. 
Worth  need  not  cease  to  be  supremely  worthful  on  account  of  causal 
connection.  The  supremely  worthful  does  not  happen  every  day;  but 
that  is  not  to  say  that  it  cannot  have  happened  at  all. 

2.  Thus,  according  to  (a)  and  (b)  above,  the  leading  me- 
thodic question  of  dogmatics  is  as  follows:     What  is  the  in- 
visible spiritual  reality  of  which  we  are  to  become  aware,  and 
whose  inner  connection  we  are  to  know  through  trustful  sur- 
render to  the  whole  revelation  of  God,  concentrated,  however, 
in  the  earthly  life  and  work  of  the  Savior,  Jesus  Christ  ?     Such 
a  dogmatics  can  take  up  into  itself  the  truth  of  the  other  meth- 


78     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ods  mentioned  in  §39 :  1.  (a)  It  draws  upon  the  Scriptures 
and  must  be  scriptural  in  the  sense  defined  in  §34:1.  (/S) 
It  proceeds  upon  the  basis  of  a  critical  knowledge  of  church 
doctrine,  and  is  thus  confessional  within  the  limits  specified 
in  §37:3.  (y)  It  seeks  to  do  justice  to  the  importance  of 
the  Christian  consciousness ;  i.  e.  in  the  case  of  every  single 
proposition  it  seeks  to  show  how  it  is  authenticated  to  us  in 
our  subjective  religious  consciousness,  i.  e.  in  personal  trust 
and,  on  the  basis  thereof,  in  inner  experience  (v.  §28).  But 
in  so  far  as  the  subjective  religious  consciousness  points  to 
basis  and  norm  of  faith  lying  outside  of  us,  the  danger  of 
subjectivism  is  checked.  (8)  It  recognizes,  with  speculative 
dogmatics,  the  need  to  exhibit  the  rationality  and  inner  unitari- 
ness  of  the  ideas  that  accrue  to  Christian  faith.  But  it  is  a 
question  whether  it  is  not  simply  the  functional  instead  of 
ontological  reality  of  these  ideas  with  which  it  is  concerned. 
In  the  former  case  it  seeks  not  theoretical  but  practical  proof 
of  rationality.  Do  the  ideas  function  serviceably  in  life  ? 
The  proof  of  the  truth  of  the  ideas  is  the  answer  to  that  ques- 
tion. Also  it  gets  at  the  inner  unity  not  by  a  dialectical  de- 
velopment of  one  proposition  out  of  another,  but  it  seeks  to 
show  how  the  Christian  propositions  of  faith,  in  their  inner 
emergence  from  faith's  understanding  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  a 
fact  do  present  a  unitary  view  as  a  whole,  and  lead  to  a  unitary, 
practical  relationship.  If  the  ideas  are  treated  as  ontological 
realities  then  we  confront  a  metaphysical  problem  of  the  old 
kind,  as  to  whether  or  not  that  ontological  reality  may  be  known 
as  such.  The  functional  contention,  in  its  more  cautious 
moods,  not  affirming,  yet  does  not  deny  ontological  verity,  but 
contents  itself  with  agnosticism  with  reference  to  the  matter. 
Ontological  agnosticism  is  overcome  in  orthodoxy  by  its  whole 
view  of  revelation  and  of  the  Bible. 

§41.  Definition  and  Demarcation  of  Our  Further  Task. 

1.  Through  the  determination  of  the  method,  the  scientific 
task  of  the  Christian  dogmatics,  sketched  in  §29,  is  more  fully 
defined,  and  the  problem  of  §1  is  concluded.  Our  further 
task  is  to  expound  the  content  of  the  Christian  faith  in  scien- 
tific reflection.  It  involves  three  special  tasks  which  are  (a) 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     79 

the  thetic   (v.   §29:2,  3),   (b)   the  apologetic1  and   (c)   the 
critical.2 

Notes  to  §41 : 1 

1.  The  apologetic  task  cannot  be  entirely  isolated  from  the  thetic 
(i.  e.  constructive  dogmatic)  task.     Each  proposition  of  modern  dog- 
matics carries  with  it  the  assumption  that  the  content  of  faith  is  in 
no   necessary   contradiction   with   the   approved   results    of   modern 
science.     For  example,  the  doctrine  of  creation  can  be  so  stated  as 
to  conflict  with  natural  science,  and  so  there  is  need  to  show  that  the 
exact  requirements  of  Christian  faith  do  not  precipitate  a  conflict 
with  science.     This  involves  an  epistemological  delimitation  of  bound- 
aries between  dogmatics  and  natural  science. 

2.  The  religio-critical  is  necessary,  since  there  must  be  discrimina- 
tion between  the  theological  construction  and  the  religious  incentive 
underlying  that  construction,  and  distinction   also  between  the  re- 
ligious and  the  philosophical  apprehension  of  spiritual  reality. 


PART  II.     THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN 
DOGMATICS 

§42.  Introductory. 

1.  We  shall  adopt  the  Christocentric  procedure  in  dogmatics, 
for  reasons  given  in  the  former  part  of  our  discussion.     But 
this  does  not  of  itself  decide  as  to  the  arrangement  of  the  differ- 
ent parts,  or  sections. 

2.  It  does  not  follow  from  the  method  previously  worked 
out  that  the  Christocentric  method  must  begin  with  the  doc- 
trine of  Christ.     In  the  first  main  division  the  revelation  given 
in  Jesus  Christ  was  presented  as  the  basis  of  all  knowledge 
that  accrues  to  faith.     (It  is  not  meant  that  quantitatively 
there  is  no  knowledge  accruing  to  faith  outside  of  person  and 
work  of  Jesus  Christ,  but  we  are  to  know  of  the  faith-knowl- 
edge alien  to  him  by  virtue  of  its  homogeneity  with  the  faith- 
knowledge  we  have  in  Jesus  Christ.)     It  is  on  this  basis  that 
we  must  first  treat  of  the  power  embracing  and  determining 
the  whole  world  as  that  world  is  to  Christian  faith,  i.  e,  God 
revealed  in  us.     Then  Jesus'  person  and  work  have  to  be  re- 
lated to  this  God  and  his  dominion.     Then  again  there  is  the 
connection  of  the  new  spiritual  forces  and  order  which  have 
issued  from  Jesus  Christ  in  history,  and  of  which  we  become 
certain  through  the  experience  of  faith.     This  too   is  to  be 
presented  in  dogmatics.     That  is,  then,  we  have  Jesus  Christ 
in  his  relation  to  God  as  the  power  and  source  of  all  with 
which  faith  has  to  do,  and  we  have  Jesus  Christ  in  his  rela- 
tion to  the  fruits  in  history  and  in  personality  of  the  divine 
presence  in  his  historical  life.     We  thus  arrive  at  three  parts 
for  dogmatics :     A.  God  and  the  World ;   B.  God   and  Jesus 
Christ  the  Lord;  C.  God  and  the  Holy  Spirit.     Part  A  may 
be  analyzed  again  into  three  main  subdivisions:     a.  The  Na- 
ture of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus  Christ;  b.  God  and  the  Finite 
World  in  General ;  c.  God  and  the  Moral  Order  of  the  World. 

80 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     81 

A.    GOD  AND  THE  WORLD 
a.  THE  NATUEE  OF  GOD  EEVEAI.ED  IN  JESUS  CHEIST. 

a.  Fundamental  Definition  of  the  Nature  of  God. 
aa.  The  View  of  Scripture  and  of  Church  Doctrine  as  to  God. 

§43.  The  Old  Testament  and  the  New  Testament  Knowledge 
of  God. 

1.  When  we  proceed  to  set  forth  the  nature  of  God  revealed 
in  Jesus  Christ,  we  are  confronted  with  the  fact  that  Jesus 
nowhere  in  his  discourses  seeks  expressly  to  establish  the  exist- 
ence of  God,  or  to  delineate  the  life  and  power  of  God  in  a 
coherent  and  comprehensive  way.  The  reason  of  this  is  that 
Jesus  together  with  his  hearers  stood  on  the  soil  of  the  Old 
Testament.  (He  stood  immediately  upon  the  soil  of  the  apoca- 
lyptic knowledge  of  God  of  his  contemporaries,  but  this  again 
was  conditioned  by  the  Old  Testament.)  *  He  presupposes  in 
the  case  of  his  hearers,  in  spite  of  many  aberrations,  a  convic- 
tion of  God's  existence,  and  correct  views  concerning  God's 
nature  and  character. 

Note  to  §43 : 1 

1.  Until  a  year  or  two  ago  [this  was  in  1905]  I  thought  that  Jesus 
overleaped    contemporary    thought   and    made   connection   with    the 
prophets.     But  I  am  now  of  the  opinion  that  this  was  not  the  case. 

2.  What  is  the  content  of  the  Old  Testament  knowledge  of 
God?     (a)   In    its   prophetic   culmination   it   has   a   two-fold 
character.     It  is  (a)  sustained  by  the  certainty  that  Jahweh 
has  revealed  himself  in  history,   particularly   in  leading  the 
people  from  Egypt,  but  also  afterwards  in  the  later  history 
of  Israel,  and  previously  in  the  time  of  the  patriarchs.     But 
all  these  historical  providences  gained    (/?)    their  importance 
first  through  the  prophetic  proclamation  in  which  they  are  put 
into  most  intimate  connection  with  the  moral  orders  of  the 
folk-life,  and  are  interpreted  as  beneficence  and  judgment  of 
a  morally  ruling  God.     Prophets  took  up  events  and  actuali- 
ties of  history  and  evaluated  them  religiously.     By  means  of 
the  intimate  connection  of  these  two  sides  (a)  and  (ft),  Jahweh 


82     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

appears  as  the  exalted  God  who  gloriously  reveals  himself  in 
blessing  and  judgment  upon  Israel,  but  at  the  same  time  as  the 
merciful,  faithful  covenant  God,  who  redeems  his  people,  (b) 
In  a  later  time  the  revelation  is  more  and  more  concentrated 
in  legislation.  In  this  way  a  particularistic  national  feature, 
a  juridical  thought  of  retribution  and  a  conception  of  natural 
sanctity  were  embodied  in  the  God-idea  ;  but  on  the  other  hand 
a  spiritualization  and  more  intimate  apprehension  of  the  rela- 
tion of  God  to  the  individual  saint  was  also  involved  in  this 
stage.1 

Note  to  §43  :  2 

1.  This  period  of  legalism  was  not  entirely  bad.     In  this  period 
there  was  emphasis  upon  the  relation  of  God  to  individual  life,  as  well 


as 


to  folk-life. 


3.  Compared  with  the  Old  Testament  knowledge  of  God, 
Jesus  knew  that  he  did  not  preach  a  new  God;  but  he  knew 
that  he  brought  the  promised  all-fulfilling  redemptive  revela- 
tion of  the  old  God.  But  this  involved  the  claim  that  he  pos- 
sessed the  full  insight  into  the  nature  or  character  of  God, 
which  had  not  been  formerly  entirely  veiled.  Jesus,  through 
his  living  redemptive  work,  could  make  man  certain  of  the 
God  of  whom  he  himself  was  certain.  This  full  penetration 
of  Jesus  into  God's  purpose  of  salvation  found  its  expression 
in  designating  the  name  Father  as  the  controlling  name  for 
God,  which  gives  norm  to  all  views  concerning  God.1 

Note  to  §43  :  3 

1.  In  the  Old  Testament  the  prophetic  summit  discloses  God  as 
Father  of  the  folk.  In  the  apocalyptic  writings  the  notion  of  God 
as  Father  of  the  individual  appears.  But  they  do  not  seem  con- 
sciously and  definitely  to  isolate  this  name  as  regulative  for  the 
Kingdom  of  God. 

[Discussing  the  question  of  the  originality  of  Jesus]  Must  not 
somebody  have  originated  something  on  his  own  account?  This  re- 
mainderless  regress  in  explaining  means  explaining  everything  by 
nothing.  The  good  God  surely  did  not  give  the  Jews  their  long  ex- 
istence as  a  mere  parenthesis  !  There  has  been  spontaneity  and  crea- 
tive originality  all  along,  even  in  the  roots  and  juices  at  the  begin- 
nings. 

There  is  greater  sensitiveness  regarding  the  truth  of  religion  today 
than  there  is  regarding  the  truth  of  anything  else. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     83 

Human  categories  are  better  than  civic,  in  interpreting  God's 
nature.  When  they  are  used,  the  divine  right  of  man  is  substituted 
for  the  divine  right  of  kings,  popes  and  officers. 

4.  Thus  too  the  disciples  of  Jesus  were  certain  that  through 
Jesus  Christ  they  had  gained  the  full  unveiling  of  the  divine 
counsel,  and  thus  the  full  knowledge  of  God,  not  first  and  not 
primarily  through  Jesus'  word,  but  through  his  whole  person 
in  his  life,  suffering,  death,  and  resurrection,  and  through  the 
Spirit   proceeding   from   the   Exalted    One.     All    this    is   ex- 
pressed in  the  designation  of  God  as  "  the  God  and  Father  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ."  1 

Note  to  §43 :  4 

1.  We  are  reminded  here  of  Weinel's  heroic  confession  of  faith, 
"  After  Jesus,  it  is  his  religion,  or  none."  After  Jesus'  God,  it  is  his 
God,  or  none.  Perhaps  not,  speculatively  and  ontologically,  but 
practically,  morally,  religiously,  spiritually  —  more  particularly,  in 
the  God-attitude  toward  man  and  history  and  the  world. 

5.  This  name  of  God  assigns  to  dogmatics  the  task  of  sys- 
tematically developing  the  content  of  the  Christian  knowledge 
of  God  on  the  basis  of  faith  in  Jesus  Christ. 

§44.  The  Doctrine  of  God  in  the  Orthodox  Ecclesiastical  Dog- 
matics. 

1.  This  task    (mentioned   in   §43 : 5)    was  set  through   the 
Reformation  views  of  the  way  to  a  true  knowledge  of  God. 
Yet  it  was  not  consistently  and  firmly  carried  out  by  the 
orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics.     To  be  sure  the  latter  had 
expressed   the  principle   that  the   perfect  knowledge   of  God 
was  to  be  borrowed  only  from  revelation;  but,  by  identifying 
revelation  with  Sacred  Scripture  viewed  as  a  text-book    (cf. 
§25:  1),  it  was  hindered  from  deriving  the  knowledge  of  God 
from  the  living  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ. 

2.  The  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics,  however,  did  not 
stop  with  the  simple  narration  of  Bible  utterances  concerning 
God,    but   gradually   advanced   to   a    systematic   development. 
But  in  this  connection  it  allowed  itself  to  be  misled  by  the 
scholastic  tradition,  and  the  result  was  that  it  made  the  uni- 
versal determination  of  the  essence  of  God  accessible  to  the 
"  natural  knowledge  of  God  "  the  ground-stock  of  the  doctrine 


84     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

of  God,  in  which  it  then  engrafted  the  specifically  Christian 
determinations.1  In  this  way  it  could  not  win  a  sure  and 
unitary  exposition  of  the  Christian  doctrine  of  God,  owing 
partly  to  the  fluctuating  character  and  partly  to  the  alien  origin 
of  the  "  natural  knowledge  of  God."  Instead  of  this  scholas- 
ticism we  have  to  take  the  path  indicated  in  §43 :  5,  in  agree- 
ment with  the  character  of  the  New  Testament  proclamation 
concerning  God  (v.  §43:  3  and  4),  and  at  the  same  time  con- 
formably to  some  old  dogmatic  method  (§40:1).  Thus  we 
have,  -first,  on  the  basis  of  faith  in  Jesus  Christ,  to  set  forth 
the  single  moments  of  the  Christian  idea  of  God ;  secondly,  to 
combine  these  moments  into  a  unitary  expression. 

Note  to  §44 :  2 

1.  Are  you  proposing  to  begin  with  a  speculative,  dialectical  de- 
termination and  construction  of  the  God-idea,  making  this  the  ground- 
stock  of  the  God-conception,  and  grafting  in  the  Christian  concept? 
The  reaction  of  the  whole  functional  movement  in  philosophy  is 
against  doing  this.  Hegelism  in  its  original  form  did  this. 

In  modern  philosophy  there  is  a  great  return  to  a  point  of  view 
more  akin  to  the  Christian  religion  in  general.  Is  the  idea  of  God 
to  be  excogitated  through  speculative  endeavor,  or  is  it  to  come 
through  great  historical  unfolding?  Through  life  it  is,  and  not 
through  speculation,  except  as  speculation  is  a  part  of  life. 

bb.  The  Systematic,  or  Constructive  Development  of  the  Chris- 
tian Doctrine  of  God.1 

§45.  The  Absolute  End  of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  or 
the  Kingdom  of  God.2 

1.  The  first  moment  of  the  knowledge  of  God  revealed  in 
Jesus  Christ  is  the  content  of  the  divine  will,  or  the  absolute 
end  of  God  as  regards  the  world,  (a)  Jesus  Christ's  whole 
life  as  person  has  its  unitary  character  in  his  knowledge  that 
his  filial  vocation  is  to  usher  in  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  to 
surrender  himself  entirely  to  this  goal.8  (b)  Trust  in  Jesus 
Christ  as  revealer  of  God  involves,  therefore,  the  conviction 
of  faith  that  this  kingdom  of  God  is  the  goal  of  the  divine 
will,  or  the  divine  end  of  the  world. 

Note  to  bb. 

1.  The  God-idea  of  the  Christian  faith  was  not  discovered  specu- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     85 

latively  and  apriori.  The  procedure  was  very  different  from  that  old 
method  which  had  the  general  standpoint  that  a  thing  must  be  so, 
therefore  it  is  so.  According  to  our  modern  standpoint,  things  are 
what  they  are,  and  we  will  look  into  them  and  find  out  what  they 
are.  This  is  science  versus  apriorism.  This  scientific  approach  to 
the  God-idea  of  Christian  faith  is  truer  to  the  Christian  faith,  and 
honors  God  more,  than  the  speculative  approach.  Still,  at  the  end  it 
will  be  found  necessary  (as  against  Ritschlianism)  to  call  in  philoso- 
phy, in  order  to  delimit  and  rationalize  the  God-idea  by  putting  it 
into  our  system  of  concepts. 

Note  to  §45 

2.  The  "  Kingdom  of  God  "  is  set  forth  in  eschatological  form  in 
Scripture,  and  yet  its  kernel  is  ethical;  we  need  not  give  up  the 
phrase. 

Note  ta  §45 : 1 

3.  "  Surrender "  is  not  a  good  word.     Formally  there  is  in  it  an 
appearance  of  a  master-subject  relation.     But  this  is  not  true  in  any 
legalistic  implication.     The  "surrender"  in  question  is  a  free  sur- 
render ;  it  does  not  abridge,  but  develops  personality.     "  Devotement " 
is  perhaps  a  better  word. 

2.  The  Kingdom  of  God  is  supramundane.1  (a)  That  is 
to  say,  qualitatively  as  to  its  inner  character,  it  does  not  con- 
sist in  the  production  of  any  sort  of  mundane  orders  and  the 
communication  of  mundane  goods,  but  in  the  possession  and 
the  exercise  of  a  personal  life  exalted  above  the  world.2  This 
personal  life  is  not  of  an  ascetic,  mystical  kind.  It  is  a  life 
in  filial  surrender  to  the  perfect  God  and  in  the  initiation  and 
exercise  of  God-like  righteousness  in  the  fellowship  of  love, 
(b)  This  inwardly  supramundane  kingdom  of  God,  as  con- 
cerned with  the  region  of  its  actualization,  is  also  transcend- 
ent ;  i.  e.  it  transports  us  into  connection  with  a  reality  which 
lies  beyond  this  empirical  world  of  our  knowledge  (cf.  §30:  2, 
b).3  This  inwardly  supramundane  kingdom  of  God  can  attain 
its  consummation  for  the  individual  and  the  community  only 
under  other  than  these  earthly  convictions  of  existence. 

Notes  to  §45 :  2 

1.  This  does  not  mean  dualism.  "  Supramundane "  is  a  noble 
word.  Personality  is  supramundane,  as  against  the  raw  and  unor- 
ganized. It  registers  a  protest  against  causality  as  a  category  that 
exhausts  reality.  It  is  almost  teleological  in  its  significance. 


86     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

2.  "The  Son  of  man  hath  not  where  to  lay  his  head."    That  is, 
there  is  no  appropriate  environment  to  the  son  of  man  in  merely 
natural  goods.     Jesus  was  thinking  of  the  supramundane. 

3.  The  natural  world  gives   (1)   sensuous  gratification,   (2)   work, 
(3)  science  and  (4)  human  love.     Beyond  all  that  is  the  spiritual. 
Work  is  good,  but  no  man's  work  is  so  perfect  or  so  fully  appreciated 
as  to  give  abiding  satisfaction.     Science  is  good,  but  instrumental, 
and  very  limited  at  that.     It  cannot  forgive  sins,  nor  can  it  give 
comfort  in  the  hour  of  sorrow  and  death.     Human  love  is  good,  but 
where  is  it  so  perfect  and  so  constant  in  its  perfectness  that  the 
human  heart  is  not  pointed  to  something  beyond  it?     The  human 
spirit  in  its  highest  moments  points  above  and  beyond  the  world  of 
empirical  reality.     "  Whom  have  I  in  heaven  but  thee?  and  on  earth 
there  is  nothing  beside  thee."     "  Thou  hast  been  our  dwelling-place 
in  all  generations."     Because  you  cannot  weigh  and  calculate  the 
supramundane,  is  it  nothing? 

3.  The  concept  "  kingdom  of  God  "  commends  itself  as  the 
comprehensive  designation  of  the  divine  end  of  the  world,  even 
on  historical  grounds.  It  is  central  in  the  proclamation  of 
Jesus.  It  is  not  so  prominent  in  the  apostolic  witness,  but  it 
is  used  in  significant  passages,  and  its  meaning  is  contained 
in  other  New  Testament  expressions.  It  is  involved  in  faith 
in  Jesus  Christ  as  "  Lord  "  (KIY>M>«),  therefore  also  in  the  con- 
cept of  God  as  "  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ "  (iraryp  TOV 
Kvpiov  rjfji.<av  Irjaov  XpioroO).1  In  later  history  of  doctrine  this 
concept,  "  kingdom  of  God,"  is  ever  revived.  On  the  Catholic 
side  the  concept  is  preserved  but  also  corrupted  by  identifying 
the  kingdom  of  God  with  the  Church  of  Rome.  On  the  Prot- 
estant side  the  comprehensive  content  of  the  concept  was  reached 
in  the  time  of  the  Reformation  and  has  been  occasionally  ex- 
pressed in  the  confessions  of  the  various  churches. 

Note  to  §45 :  3 

1.  The  Christian's  God  is  the  kind  of  God  of  which  Jesus  Christ  is 
a  fair  representative.  After  Jesus,  it  is  his  God  —  i.e.  essentially  — 
or  none. 

4.  But  this  concept  "  kingdom  of  God  "  is  available  on  syste- 
matic grounds  also.     It  is  the  most  comprehensive  designation 
of  the  Christian  salvation,  for  the  kingdom  of  God  is  pre- 
sented in  our  salvation   (a)   as  at  once  religious  and  moral, 
(b)  as  at  the  same  time  immanent  and  transcendent,  present 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     87 

and  future,  (c)  as  an  affair  both  of  the  human  community  and 
of  the  individual,  (d)  as  God's  supreme  end  and  as  our  per- 
sonal supreme  end.  Through  all  this  the  absoluteness  of  the 
divine  end  comes  to  expression  most  distinctly  on  two  sides. 
It  is  unconditionally  worthful,  and  it  does  not  exist  for  the 
sake  of  the  world,  but  the  world  for  it. 

5.  With  this  definition  and  determination  of  the  divine  end, 
the  Christian  God-idea  is  exalted  into  the  sphere  of  the  supra- 
mundane,  and  owing  to  the  ethical  content  of  that  end,  it  is 
exalted  into  the  sphere  of  the  purely  ethical.  Moreover,  the 
God-idea  is  thereby  freed  in  principle  from  all  the  limits  (a) 
of  nature-,  folk-  and  law-religions,  as  well  as  (b)  of  the  other 
redemption-religions  (e.g.  Buddhism  and  Neo-Platonism ;  v. 
§13),  as  also  from  those  (c)  of  the  Old  Testament  views  of 
God  (v.  §43:2).  It  is  only  when  we  rise  into  that  sphere 
of  the  ethical  life  that  we  ourselves  can  come  to  the  God  of 
Christian  faith.1  2 

Notes  to  §45 :  5 

1.  There  is  nothing  to  be  said  more  important  than  this,  that  it  is 
only  when  we  rise  into  the  sphere  of  the  ethical  life  that  we  can  meet 
the  God  of   the   Christian  religion.     Also   morality   is   healthy   and 
strong  only  in  the  warm  sunshine  of  religious  enthusiasm.     In  Mar- 
cus Aurelius,   Seneca  and   Epictetus  we  see  a  fine  morality.     Yet 
there  is  one  thing  lacking,  and  so  it  does  not  become  a  procreative 
reality.     What  is  lacking  is  the  note  of  victory,  such  as  we  find  in 
Paul's  "Rejoice  in  the  Lord  always;  and  again  I  say,  Rejoice."     Sto- 
icism may  be  heroic,  but  it  is  not  enthusiastic.     Its  morality  is  like 
that  of  the  Indian,  bitched  to  a  tree  and  not  flinching,  though  arrows 
are  shot  at  him.     Christian  morality  is  like  that  of  the  fireman  saving 
the  child.     The  one  looks  selfward ;  the  other,  outward  and  onward. 

2.  In  the  whole  history  of  religion  there  seem  to  be  two  ways  in 
which  God  has  been  looked  upon  as  coming  to  man,  viz.  in  revelation 
and  in  sacrament. 

Revelation  is  inner,  personal,  spiritual,  ethical.  It  ought  not  to  be 
made  complex  and  difficult  to  us.  It  is  the  way  you  reveal  youreslf 
to  your  friend,  when  you  live  with  him. 

Sacrament  is  defined  as  an  external  communication  of  the  divine 
substance  to  man,  through  the  senses.  The  God-idea  involved  is 
sub-Christian  and  pre-Christian.  It  is  not  yet  lifted  up  into  the 
fully  ethical  sphere.  What  is  required  of  you  that  you  may  meet 
God  by  way  of  sacrament?  The  service  of  brothers?  Not  at  all, 
and  so  its  way  of  getting  God  is  wrong. 

Jesus  was  absolutely  free  from  this  sacramentism.     Hia  way  to. 


88     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

God  is  the  free  fulfilment  of  certain  moral  requirements.  He  anni- 
hilates the  sacraments.  Sacramentism  is  wrapped  up  with  asceti- 
cism and  mysticism,  and  has  no  social  reference.  The  old  psychology 
of  possession  underlies  mysticism;  this  was  the  way  of  accounting 
for  all  inner  crises  and  cataclysms.  It  persists  in  the  doctrine  of  the 
internal  testimony  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Such  mysticism  is  not  neces- 
sarily ethical,  and  it  has  to  go.  There  is  no  verifiable  psychology  of 
possession.  Martin  Luther  shared  the  old  psychology  of  possession. 
One  cannot  imagine  the  modern  business  man  throwing  an  inkstand 
at  the  devil;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  he  is  greater  than  Luther. 
Luther  is  Luther  all  the  same.  The  same  may  be  said  of  Paul.  He 
introduced  pre-Christian  elements  in  his  rationalizing  of  the  death 
of  the  Messiah;  but  he  could  wish  himself  accursed  for  his  brethren's 
sake.  Luther  made  the  modern  world;  Paul  made  a  new  type  of 
civilization.  They  were  great  in  spite  of  their  defective  psychology 
and  apologetics,  which  did  their  work  in  their  own  time  and  place. 
Perhaps  Paul  ought  to  have  thrown  overboard  more  than  he  did, 
but  he  saved  the  ship,  and  that  is  the  main  consideration. 

The  correlates  of  revelation  and  sacrament  on  the  human  side  are 
prayer  and  offering.  Prayer  is  not  saying  prayers.  It  is  communion 
with  God  —  a  moral  yearning.  It  is  profoundly  ethical.  Offering 
was  originally  something  given  to  God  which  it  was  believed  he 
would  enjoy,  as  something  to  eat,  or  to  smell.  But  the  Christian's 
God  is  the  being  to  whom  nothing  can  be  given,  since  he  has  all 
things  —  except  your  will,  and  to  give  this  to  God  is  to  possess  it 
more  surely.  A  catholicizing  deterioration  of  religion  began  with 
the  apologetics  for  the  death  of  Christ,  when  the  offering-idea  was 
introduced.  The  Messiah's  crucifixion  was  regarded  as  the  Chris- 
tian's propitiatory  offering  to  God.  A  deterioration  of  Jesus'  religion 
began  in  this,  no  matter  who  did  it. 

When  did  sacraments  begin  to  take  the  place  of  revelation  and 
prayer?  When  the  Lord's  Supper  and  baptism  took  on  redemption 
values.  Paul  makes  an  argument  for  the  resurrection  out  of  vicari- 
ous baptism  for  the  dead.  And  was  it  mere  figure  of  speech  when 
he  spoke  of  eating  the  body  and  blood  of  Christ?  Was  there  not 
some  sacramentism  in  Paul?  Wrede  and  Weinel  think  Paul  was 
essentially  a  Roman  Catholic  sacramentist.  I  am  not  convinced 
that  this  is  as  true  as  they  try  to  make  out.  With  Paul,  the  kernel 
was  the  same  as  with  Jesus,  viz.  the  moral  and  the  religious.  At 
any  rate,  sacrament  and  offering  are  pre-Christian  and  sub-Christian. 
Revelation  and  prayer,  the  religion  of  morality  —  this  is  what  makes 
up  the  content  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus.  No  offering  is  required 
but  the  day's  toil  and  the  night's  prayer.  The  blessing  comes  not 
through  sacrament,  but  through  communion. 

I  am  not  prepared  to  say  that  sacrament  and  offering  have  had  no 
pedagogic  value.  But  they  are  not  Christian ;  they  are  not  the  sum- 
mit and  finality  of  our  religion.  Perfumery,  the  "  dim  religious 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     89 

light,"  candles,  and  the  like  —  all  this  is  the  easy  way  of  the  child 
and  the  undeveloped.  The  race  seems  to  fail  to  rise  to  Jesus'  atti- 
tude. In  the  morality  of  his  inner  disposition  and  in  his  religion 
of  a  moral  God,  it  looks  more  as  if  the  race  would  never  get  up  to 
Jesus,  than  that  it  would  get  ahead  of  him,  and  he  fail  to  he  final. 

§46.  The  Spiritual  Work  of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  in 
order  to  the  Realization  of  His  Kingdom. 

1.  In  order  to  the  full  Christian  view  of  God  1  and  in  order 
to  the  full  concept  of  the  supramundaneness  and  ethical  per- 
fection of  God  there  must  be  not  merely  the  knowledge  of  the 
divine  end,  but  also  of  the  work  constantly  directed  to  the 
actualization  of  that  end,  and  especially  of  the  work  of  God 
powerfully  revealing  itself  in  the  life  of  the  human  spirit.2 

Notes  to  §46 : 1 

1.  There  is  a  great  difference  between  a  religionless,  speculative 
manufacture  of  a  God-idea,  and  going  to  a   definite  religion   and 
seeing  what  kind  of  a  God-idea  the  religion  has  produced. 

2.  My  friend,   James   Ten   Broeke,   holds  that   a   man's   essential 
reality  is  the  purpose  he  sets  up  and  the  energy  with  which  he  sets 
himself  to  realize  that  purpose.     May  we  not  apply  this  to  the  God- 
idea  as  well  ? 

2.  This  is  embraced  in  the  Biblical  concept  also  of  "  the 
God  and  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  "  (0eos  KOI  ira-njp  TOV 
Kvpiov  rjiiS»v  Irjvov  Xpurrov}.     (a)  Jesus  himself  was  conscious 
of  presenting  the  kingdom  of  God  as  the  divine  end  of  the 
world,  but  also  of  ushering  it  in  with  his  Messianic  work  in 
a  way  that  through  him  a  redeeming  power  of  God  became 
operative   in  the   hearts   of  men.     (b)   Accordingly  the  first 
community  was  certain  that  in  Jesus  Christ,  both  the  earthly 
and  the  exalted  one,  God's  redeeming  work  of  grace  became 
mighty,  in  order  to  the  actualization  of  his  counsels  in  that 
community.     God  himself  thus  became  to  the  primitive  com- 
munity "  God  our  Savior  "  (0eos  SWTT^  ^/iwv). 

3.  In  agreement  therewith  the  certainty  of  a  work  of  God 
redeeming  and  educating  us  for  his  kingdom  is  the  result  for 
us  of  faith  in  Jesus  Christ.     This  appears   (a)   centrally  in 
the  personal  life  of  Jesus  Christ  himself,  which  is  the  only 
possible  starting  point  for  the  suprainundane  rule  of  God  be- 
coming directly  actual  in  the  hearts  of  men  (cf.   §26:1-3); 


90     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

(b)  in  addition,  in  the  spiritual  life  of  Christianity,  through 
which  that  redeeming  work  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  is  mediated 
to  us  to-day  (§26:  4) ;  *  (c)  but  also  in  God's  work  of  revela- 
tion preparatory  for  the  kingdom  of  Jesus  Christ. 

Note  to  §46 : 3 

1.  On  the  basis  of  the  old  psychology  and  world-view  men  could 
easily  conceive  of  the  mediation  of  God's  redeeming  work  by  the  real 
presence  of  the  exalted  Jesus,  now  omnipresent  in  the  individuals 
and  in  the  community,  and  the  redemptive  work  of  God  could  be 
thought  of  as  carried  on  by  the  post-existent  ubiquitous  Christ.  This 
was  elaborated  greatly  by  the  post-Reformation  theology.  But  there 
are  two  difficulties  with  this  view.  The  first  is  a  psychological  diffi- 
culty, rendering  unintelligible  the  mystic  real  presence  of  Christ's 
consciousness  in  us.  The  other  difficulty,  which  is  philosophical,  is 
that  of  how  the  man  Jesus  could  become  ubiquitous  and  omnipresent. 
It  means  the  integration  into  the  man  Jesus,  on  His  return  to  the 
Father,  of  the  Divine  attributes  of  omnipotence  and  the  rest.  This  is 
philosophically  unthinkable,  and  the  whole  conception  lacks  ethical 
effectiveness.  Theologians  and  Biblical  historians  have  retired  the 
thought  of  a  post-existent  redemptive  efficiency  of  the  ubiquitous 
Jesus,  in  favor  of  the  persistence  of  the  power  of  the  human,  his- 
torical Jesus,  and  the  redemptive  effect  of  the  spiritual  community 
on  its  members  and  on  others  outside.  The  idea  of  a  physical- 
metaphysical,  human-superhuman  influence  of  the  post-existent  Jesus 
is  rightly  given  up.  The  conception  of  a  pre-existent  being  laying 
aside  his  attributes,  and  a  post-existent  being  taking  back  his  attri- 
butes, would  have  significance  for  a  metaphysical,  not  for  a  moral, 
way  of  salvation.  Moreover,  this  whole  conception  of  an  extra- 
historical  being  entering  the  human  race  is  mythology  pure  and  sim- 
ple. Indeed  the  old  conception  of  the  Trinity  and  of  the  Deity  of 
Christ  is  pure  mythology,  and  there  can  be  adhesion  to  the  mythology 
without  the  inner  process  of  redemption. 

To  return  to  the  psychological  difficulty,  it  is  to  be  admitted  that 
to  the  seer  hallucination  is  as  real  at  the  time  as  the  perception  of 
reality.  And  in  the  old  psychology  the  inner  seeing  was  thought  of 
as  real.  But  from  the  point  of  view  of  modern  psychology  what  is 
seen,  even  in  Paul's  experience,  is  simply  subjective  4<  vision."  At  all 
events,  we  must  interpret  Paul's  vision  and  the  drunkard's  vision  sim- 
ilarly, i.  e.  either  both  according  to  the  old  psychology  or  both  accord- 
ing to  the  new  psychology.  Besides,  the  real  proof  of  Paul's  conver- 
sion was  not  the  vision  or  the  voice,  but  the  right-about-face  in  his 
life.  Paul  could  beat  them  all  at  visions,  but  he  showed  a  more  ex- 
cellent way  —  the  way  of  ethical  love.  No,  the  religio-historical 
school  are  wrong  in  their  interpretation  of  Paul.  He  knew  what  was 
worth  while. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     91 

4.  Thus  we  recognize  in  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  God's  spirit- 
ual power  directed  to  the  actualization  of  the  divine  end  of  the 
world.  It  is  in  this  way  especially  that  God  is  revealed  within 
the  spiritual,  historical  life  of  humanity  as  the  living  One, 
or  as  "  Life,"  "  Light,"  "  Spirit."  This  is  not  true  in  the 
sense  that  God's  life  is  to  be  identified  with  the  whole  life  of 
humanity,  but  in  the  sense  that  within  the  latter  God  develops 
a  supramundane  kingdom  with  redeeming  power.  It  is  only 
in  personal  receptivity  for  the  kingdom  of  God  that  we  our- 
selves find  the  living  God. 

§47.  The  World-Governing  Work  of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus 
Christ  in  order  to  the  Actualization  of  His  Kingdom. 

1.  The  Christian  God-idea  is  not  yet  fully  formed  with  the 
two  moments  already  developed  (§§45,  46).     For  did  one  stop 
there  a  gnostic  God-idea  and  a  dualistic  world-view  would  not 
be  repelled.     The  reason  we  cannot  stop  there  is  to  be  found 
in  the  intimate  connection  between  history  and  the  order  of 
nature. 

2.  There  is  indeed  a  third  moment  in  the  Biblical  faith  in 
God.     (a)  Jesus  led  his  disciples  in  all  the  gifts  they  received 
and  in  all   their  sufferings  to  look  up  to  God  as  the  Lord 
even  of  the  natural  order  ("  Lord  of  heaven  and  earth  "),  and 
Jesus  himself  finished  his  entire  work  with  the  certainty  that 
all  that  befell  him  even  according  to  the  natural  order,  even 
though  it  were  brought  on  by  the  will  of  the  sinful  human 
world,  was  yet  absolutely  subject  to  the  necessity  (Set)  of  the 
divine  counsel,      (b)   The  first  community  fastened  on  to  the 
Old  Testament  conviction  of  faith  as  to  God's  world-ruling 
power,  and  they  did  this  directly  in  the  paradox  of  the  cross 
of  Christ,  and  in  the  experience  of  his  appearances  after  death. 

3.  For  us  also  this  same  certainty  is  founded  in  the  faith 
that  in  the  case  of  Jesus  Christ  everything,  even  suffering  and 
death,  served  and  had  to  serve  the  consummation  of  his  person 
and  work,  and  that  this  inner  consummation  must  lead  to  outer 
victory.     This  faith  receives  further  confirmation  or  corrobora- 
tion  whenever  anything  of  the  guidance  of  the  outer  process 
of  the  world  is  seen  to  serve  the  end  of  the  kingdom  of  God  — 


92     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

anything  in  the  order  and  process  of  the  world,  whether  it  be 
(a)  in  the  outer  fortunes  of  the  children  of  Israel,  or  (b)  of 
Christianity,  or  (c)  of  the  rest  of  human  history,  or  (d)  in 
the  leadings  of  our  own  life.  Yet  such  outer  guidances  in  their 
importance  and  significance  are  never  so  externally  evident 
that  faith  in  God's  world-ruling  power  becomes  vision;  and 
insight  into  the  guidances  of  God  understandable  to  us  is  never 
so  extensive  that  this  side  of  Christian  faith  can  dispense  with 
its  foundation  in  Jesus  Christ.1 

Note  to  §47 :  3 

1.  What  would  constitute  the  Christian  triumph  over  pain,  suffer- 
ing, evil  in  the  world?  Taking  it  away  or  discovering  some  antidote 
is  a  negative  solution  of  the  problem.  The  Christian  triumph  is  in 
chaining  the  evil  to  our  chariot  wheel,  converting  the  burden  or  men- 
ace into  a  servant  of  the  maturing  of  the  inner  life.  This  is  abso- 
lute victory,  making  my  master  my  slave. 

This  mastery  is  not  through  perfect  knowledge  and  explanation  of 
God's  will  with  reference  to  it.  It  is  not  by  sight,  but  by  faith.  It 
is  not  that  we  know  how  God  behaves  empirically,  but  that  we  know 
God,  the  God  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  knowing  him  we  say,  "  I  do  not 
know  why  this  evil  is  in  my  life;  perhaps  I  could  not  know;  but  I 
know  that  God  knows  why  it  is  there.  It  is  enough  for  the  child  to 
know  that  the  Father  knows."  "  We  know  that  all  things  work  to- 
gether for  good,"  wrote  Paul.  Now  Paul  did  not  know  either  the  "  all 
things  "  or  the  "  working  together  "  or  the  "  good  " ;  but,  knowing 
God,  he  passes  to  this  conviction  by  faith,  and  triumphs  by  it.  Mere 
explanation  would  be  inadequate  to  produce  this  result. 

§48.  Comprehensive  Definition  of  the  Essence  of  God  (God 
as  "Love,"  as  "Heavenly  Father"). 

1.  The  three  moments  of  the  God-idea  developed   in   §§45 
to  47  are  indissolubly  interrelated;  therefore  it  is  impossible 
to  derive  one  from  another,  but  it  is  of  course  possible  to  seek 
a  unitary  comprehensive  expression  for  the  three    (i.  e.   the 
supramundaneness,  the  end  and  the  work),  and  this  in  adhesion 
to  the  New  Testament  wherever  possible. 

2.  In  the  New  Testament  we  have  a  comprehensive  charac- 
terization, above  all  in  the  proposition,  "  God  is  love."     The 
content  of  this  concept   ("love")   is  made  clear  in   (a)   the 
ever-imperfect  analogy  of  the  noblest  human  love;  above  all 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     93 

(b)  in  the  perfect  love  of  Jesus  Christ,  who  not  only  visualizes, 
so  to  speak,  but  brings  God's  love  to  us;  (c)  in  the  personal 
experience  of  God's  love  in  our  own  inner  and  outer  life. 

3.  This   is   regulative   for   Christian   dogmatics   also,      (a) 
For  it  also  the  concept  "  love  "  is  the  best  designation  of  the 
unitary  character  of  God  which  the  Christian  view  of  God, 
in  opposition  to  the  thought  of  an  impassive  ("  impassible  ") 
Being,  or  of  an  arbitrary  or  capricious  God,  affirms  and  must 
affirm,     (b)  Dogmatics  has  to  borrow  the  definition  or  deter- 
mination of  the  content  of  this  concept  of  love  from  revelation 
of  God.     (c)  The  single  moments  of  the  concept  "  love  "  which 
may  be  thus  gained  are  the  following:     (a)  The  object  of 
love  is  spiritual  personalities.     In  principle,  not  in  fact,  the 
original  object  of  the  divine  love  is  Christ,  accordingly  then 
through  Christ  the  community  of  the  redeemed,  then  the  world 
in  general  (John  3:  16).     (/8)   The  goal  of  the  divine  love  is 
man's  spiritual  and  moral  best ;  that  is  to  say,  the  initiation 
and  perfection  of  their  personal  communion  with  God,   and 
their  fellowship  with  one  another  in  faith  and  love;  and  this 
goal  thus  dually  expressed  is  yet  a  unitary  one  as  regards  this 
relation  of  fellowship.1      (y)   The  mode  of  the  divine  love  to 
us  is  not,  as  with  men,  self-abnegation,  but  yet  it  does  involve 
what  used  to  be  meant  by  the  words  "  condescension "   and 
"  sacrifice  " —  sacrifice  even  to  the  surrender  of  his  most  worthy, 
his  Son.     Thus  the  death  of  Christ  is  the  most  precious  asset 
in  human  history. 

Note  to  §48 : 3 

1.  There  is  no  relation  to  God  which  is  not  a  relation  to  man,  and 
there  is  no  relation  to  man  which  is  not  a  relation  to  God.  If  you 
treat  man  fairly  decently,  you  treat  God  fairly  decently. 

4.  The  love  of  God  in  which  we  have  faith  mounts  above  all 
human  love,     (a)   God's  love  is  holy,  i.e.   it  wills  only  the 
truly  good  and  excludes  everything  that  is  contrary  thereto, 
or  all  that  is  sinful.     But  since  God's  opposition  to  sin   is 
active  precisely  in  his  redeeming  and  pedagogic  love,  there  is 
no  sort  of  tension  between  holiness  and  love,  but  true  holiness 
is  perfect  love,  and  vice  versa,     (b)   God's  love,  however,  is 
exalted  above  the  finite  world  and  regnant  over  it.     In  simpler 


94     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

expression  all  this  is  comprised  in  the  phrase  "  Our  heavenly 
Father"  (6  Tra-njp  fjfuav  6  ov/mvios).  The  concept  "Father" 
designates  God  not  only  as  (a)  author  of  spirits,  but  also  as 
(b)  generator  of  a  new  eternal  life  in  the  individual  and  in 
the  community,  and  (c)  as  educator  therefor.  The  concept 
"  heavenly,"  even  with  our  changed  picture  of  the  world,  ex- 
presses most  distinctly  (a)  his  exaltedness  above  human  fini- 
tude  and  sin,  and  also  (b)  the  world-ruling  power  of  God. 

Note  to  §48 : 4 

1.  Dorner's  phrase,  "  holy  love,"  sets  forth  the  essential  character  of 
the  Christian  God. 

cc.  Critical  Limitation. 

§49.  The  Apparent  Contradiction  between  the  Concept  "  Per- 
sonality "  and  the  Absoluteness  of  God. 

1.  Two  concepts  are  included  in  the  thought  of  God  as  heav- 
enly Father.1  These  concepts  illumine  both  the  limitation  of 
the  Christian  knowledge  of  God  over  against  false  conceptions, 
and  also  its  own  inner  limits  (cf.  §41:2,  c,  a  and  0).  (a) 
When  we  think  of  God  as  Father,  or  as  holy  Love,  we  apply 
to  him  the  concept  of  spiritual  personality,  in  which  all  those 
personal  predicates  inhere  with  which  we  as  Christians  speak 
of  God.  (b)  When  we  think  of  God  as  "heavenly,"  or  as 
exalted  above  the  world,  or  as  ruling  over  the  world,  we  at- 
tribute absoluteness  to  him.  In  the  system  or  connection  of 
the  Christian  faith  this  concept  cannot  designate  the  entire 
nature  or  essence  of  God.  It  does  not  even  give  the  main 
determination  or  definition  of  the  divine  essence  from  which 
all  others  could  be  derived.  It  is  a  logical  abstraction.  Its 
function  is  to  set  forth  God  as  the  Unconditioned,  i.  e.  as  the 
non-conditioned  and  the  all-conditioning. 

Note  to  §49 : 1 

1.  See  J.  Caird:  Fundamental  Ideas  of  Christianity;  Wundt's  Sys- 
tem der  Philosophic  (the  chapter  on  Religion)  ;  Paulsen's  Introduc- 
tion to  Philosophy  (chapters  on  Theism  and  Pantheism) ;  Eucken : 
Die  Wahrheitsgehalt  der  Religion. 

2.  But,  thus  understood,  the  concept,  absoluteness  of  God, 
seems  to  be  in  strained  relations  with  that  of  the  divine  per- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     95 

sonality.  The  concept,  absoluteness,  since  it  exalts  God  above 
everything  finite,  seems  to  exclude  not  only  all  gross  anthropo- 
morphisms, but  also  all  psychological  concepts  in  general  and 
all  analogies  of  human  personal  life  from  the  correct  knowl- 
edge of  God,  and  places  us  before  the  dilemma  of  either  drag- 
ging God  down  to  the  finite,  or  else  making  him  unusable  and 
incomprehensible  for  our  religious  life.1 

Note  to  §49: 2 

1.  How  we  manipulate  and  metaphysicize  the  God-idea  till  it  is 
religiously  valueless!  Look  at  Neo-Platonism,  for  instance,  with  its 
"  super-essential  existence."  Ultimate  reality  is  set  forth  in  symbols, 
to  be  sure,  for  religious  people;  but  is  there  any  reality  which  is  not 
so  set  forth  ? 

3.  Two  speculative  attempts  have  been  made  to  solve  this 
difficulty,     (a)   On  the  one  side  there  is  the  attempt  to  affirm 
the  psychological  conception  that  we  apply  to  God  as  an  ade- 
quate presentation  of  the  form  of  the  divine  Being  and  work. 
But  since  these  concepts  never  admit  being  developed  to  full 
clearness  and  freedom  from  contradiction,  they  ever  prove  to 
be  inadequate  with  reference  to  the  form  of  God's  inner  life 
and  mode  of  operation,     (b)   On  the  other  side  there  is  the 
attempt  to  purify  the  psychological  concepts  of  all  inadequate 
elements,  and  in  this  way  to  attain  to  a  purely  logical  knowl- 
edge of  God.     But  this  goal  of  purification  is  never  entirely 
reached  (witness  Lotze  and  Weisse),1  and  as  regards  the  God- 
idea  precisely  that  is  lost  in  this  way  which  is  the  main  thing 
to  the  Christian  faith,  viz.  a  divine  purpose,  an  end,  a  dispo- 
sition that  we  know  of,  because  it  is  like  the  human. 

Note  to  §49 :  3 

1.  By  the  time  you  have  left  out  all  that  does  not  apply  to  God 
(Lotze),  you  have  left  vox  et  preterea  nihil.  If  you  say  that  God  is 
personal,  but  that  his  personality  is  not  of  our  kind  (Weisse),  what 
knowledge  can  we  have  of  it?  (This  is  like  saying  miracles  are  ac- 
cording to  law,  but  a  higher  law  than  any  yet  discovered,  whereas  we 
do  not  know  whether  or  not  there  is  any  such  higher  law.) 

4.  Hence  we  must  substitute  critical  insight  for  these  specu- 
lative endeavors.     To  begin  with,  that  dilemma  is  falsely  put 
To  be  sure,  all  the  psychological  analogies  applied  to  God  may 


96     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

not  be  considered  as  adequate  delineations  of  the  form  of  the 
super-temporal  inner  life  of  God.1  But  they  do  not  seek  to 
be  adequate,2  although  they  are  the  indispensable,  thoroughly 
correct  and  clear  designations  of  the  content  and  direction  of 
the  divine  nature  and  work  revealed  in  Christ  and  knowable 
to  faith. 

Note  to  §49 : 4 

1.  The  modern  notion  of  personality  contradicts  the  old  notion  of 
substance  (ovaia).     But  the  contradiction  is  not  so  serious  with  the 
new  idea  of  reality  as  purposive  activity. 

2.  Neither  in  the  Bible  nor  out  of  it  is  it  claimed  that  psychology 
is  an  adequate  delineation  of  God.     Our  ordinary  descriptions,  how- 
ever, are  functionally  sufficient  for  the  purposes  of  life,  even  while 
they  are  not  a  full  delineation  of  the  reality.     No  science  penetrates 
into  the  interior  of  things;  it  is  the  business  of  life  to  get  there,  and 
it  can  be  done  with  the  aid  of  symbols  and  hints. 

5.  Above  all,  the  not  merely  psychological  but  also  ethical 
concept  of  spiritual  personality  designates  God  accordingly 
as  he  (a)  who  subordinates  all  work  in  the  natural  and 
human  world  to  purely  spiritual  ethical  values,  i.  e.  to  his  king- 
dom of  ethical  personalities,  and  (b)  who  penetrates  to  the 
innermost  needs  of  any  single  ethical  personality,  so  that  the 
latter,  believing  and  praying,  can  enter  into  mutual  relations 
with  God.1  This  concept,  which  involves  rejection  of  all  pan- 
theistic views  of  God,  is  not  in  conflict  with  the  concept  of 
absoluteness,  critically  circumscribed,  but  even  exalts  the  latter 
to  the  concept  of  the  absolute  self-dependence  of  God  (free- 
dom).2 

Notes  to  §49 :  5 

1.  This  functional  language  is  indispensable  to  religion. 

2.  The  modern  mind  can  predicate  freedom  only  if  it  is  true  of 
everything. 

§50.  The  Revealed  and  the  Hidden  Sides  of  God's  Being. 

1.  The  investigation  of  the  problem  of  §49  has  led  us  to  the 
limits  of  the  Christian  knowledge  of  God  in  general.  Its  com- 
prehensive delimitation  follows  from  the  Christian  concept  of 
revelation  (see  §§25  to  27).  (a)  The  form  of  the  supra- 
mundane  life  of  God  remains  hidden  to  the  Christian  knowl- 


SUPERSTRUCTUKE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     97 

edge  of  God,  on  the  one  hand;  on  the  other  hand  the  form  of 
his  work,  i.  e.  the  mode  and  manner,  the  way  he  begins  to 
determine  the  world  according  to  his  end  —  this  also  is  hidden, 
(b)  Especially  the  "  things  that  are  freely  given  us  of  God  " 
(TO,  VTTO  TOV  6eov  xapwOtvTa-  rffuv)  are  revealed  for  our  knowledge 
and  experience  of  faith,  and  the  "  deep  things  of  God  "  (paGy 
TOV  6eov)  are  made  known  to  us,  according  to  Christian  convic- 
tion, in  and  through  this  same  knowledge  and  experience  of 
faith,  i.  e.  the  depth  of  his  love,  and  the  "  mystery  "  (/AVOTJJ/JIOV) 
of  his  counsel.  Thus  while  we  are  not  able  to  penetrate  the 
form,  we  can  the  real  content  of  his  eternal  Being  and  will, 
i.  e.  his  purpose,  behind  which  we  have  to  seek  no  dark  nature- 
ground  in  God,  and  no  mysterious  will  otherwise  directed.1 

Note  to  §50 : 1 

1.  "  God  is  Light,  and  in  him  is  no  darkness  at  all"  i.  e.  nothing 
undetermined,  unorganized,   not  concentrated  purposively.     This   is 
the  great  idea  from  the  point  of  view  of  Christian  faith. 

2.  But  an  incompleteness  ever  belongs  to  our  knowledge  of 
God,  even  within  the  region  accessible  to  us.      (a)   It  is  only 
gradually  and  imperfectly  that  the  inexhaustibly  rich  content 
of  the  redemptive  goal  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ  (§45)  and  the 
redemptive  work  of  God  (§46)  are  capable  of  being  known  and 
experienced,      (b)   It  is  only  gradually  and  by  piecemeal  that 
we  learn  to  understand  the  outer  processes  in  the  world  and 
life  (§47),  as  means  to  the  actualization  of  the  divine  will  in 
the  world  and  in  the  life  of  the  individual. 

3.  We  can  give  expression  for  ourselves  and  for  others  to 
that  which  is  knowable  of  God  only  in  our  forms  of  thought, 
and  with  the  help  of  the  concepts  borrowed  from  our  own 
psychic  life.     This  is  equally  true  of  scientific  dogmatics  (v. 
§29 :  3),  and  of  the  practical  ecclesiastical  preaching.     Still  the 
following  norms  are  to  be  kept  in  mind  in  employing  these  ex- 
pressions:    (a)   Those  forms  of  expression  are  to  be  employed 
with  the  clear  consciousness  that  they  have  only  a  parabolic 
character  as  regards  the  form  of  God's  life  and  work,     (b) 
They  are  to  be  so  shaped  as  to  designate  the  nature  of  God 
revealed  in  Jesus  Christ  as  pertinently,  as  popularly  and  as 
impressively  as  possible,  and  they  are  correct  and  true  accord- 


98     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ing  as  they  attain  this  functional  end.  The  functional  reality 
will  itself  suggest  what  needs  to  be  known  of  the  ontological 
reality,  (c)  They  should  be  preserved  as  much  as  possible  in 
continuity  («)  with  the  Biblical  form  of  presentation,  espe- 
cially that  employed  by  Jesus  Christ,  and  (/?)  with  the  con- 
ceptual coinage  of  the  evangelical  churches,  without  thereby 
excluding  a  further  development  of  forms  of  expression.1 

Note  to  §50 :  3 

1.  Take,  for  example,  the  word  "regeneration."  We  must  not 
preach  that  character  is  so  mercurial  that  it  can  be  magically  recon- 
structed all  of  a  sudden.  We  must  emphasize  growth,  as  against  old 
ideas  of  regeneration.  And  yet  we  must  recognize  times  of  cataclysm 
in  human  experience  and  life.  The  new  words  are  out  of  the  new  life, 
and  so  are  fitted  to  serve  that  life.  But  let  us  not  make  a  breach 
with  the  past,  save  for  purposes  of  service.  We  must  gather  the  eter- 
nal gospel  into  the  newer  categories  for  some  minds,  and  we  must 
continue  to  use  the  old  categories  for  others.  The  business  of  preach- 
ing is  to  do  something.  A  sermon  ought  to  function  serviceably  in 
the  community,  and  so  it  has  to  fit. 

0.  The  Trinitarian  Unfolding  of  the  God-Idea. 

§51.  Exposition  and  Evaluation  of  the  Christian  Doctrine  of 
the  Trinity. 

1.  Our  principiant  attitude  toward  the  ecclesiastical  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity,1  into  which  the  doctrine  de  Deo  of  the 
old  dogmaticians  emptied,  follows  from  our  fundamental  defi- 
nition of  the  nature  of  God. 

Note  to  §51 : 1 

1.  Shall  we  rip  up  and  destroy  the  Trinitarian  formulation,  if  by 
doing  so  we  fall  into  the  Unitarian  formulation,  whereas  both  are 
wrong? 

2.  In  the  orthodox  ecclesiastical  exposition  of  the  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  we  are  to  note  the  following:     (a)   Its  char- 
acter as  a  whole,  i.  e.  its  relation  to  reason,  to  Scripture  and 
to  the  faith  of  the  Christian,     (b)   The  main  propositions  it 
lays  down  concerning  (a)  the  one  Divine  Being,  (ft)  the  three 
Divine  Persons,  and  (y)  the  mutual  separation  and  community 
of  these  persons,     (c)  The  means  of  proof  and  of  elucidation 
employed. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     99 

3.  A  criticism  dependent  upon  the  history  of  dogma  of  the 
ecclesiastical    doctrine   of  the   Trinity    shows   the   following: 
(a)   The  religious  basic  views  of  Christianity  gave  impulse 
to  its  formation  in  the  old  church.     But  at  the  same  time  pe- 
culiar conceptions  of  the  Christian  salvation  and  speculative 
interests  co-operated,  and  on  that  account  other  fruitful  thoughts 
of  the  Christian  religion  were  crowded  out.     (b)  In  the  refor- 
mation the  evangelical  knowledge  of  salvation  was  interpreted 
in  the  use  of  the  traditional  doctrine  of  the  Trinity.     The  new 
content  did  not  burst  the  forms,  which  did  not  yet  correspond 
to   that   content ;    but   rationalism   subsequently   disintegrated 
these  forms  without,  however,  properly  appreciating  and  pro- 
tecting the  religious  content.1 

Note  to  §51 : 3 

1.  Rationalism  was  scientifically  more  satisfactory  to  the  intellect; 
but  it  was  always  unsatisfactory  religiously. 

4.  Biblical  theological  criticism  leads  to  the  result  that  the 
ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  not  a  synthesis  of  the 
content  of  the  Scriptures,  but  rests  upon  violent  interpretation 
of  single  sayings  in  the  Scriptures,  and  their  artificial  weav- 
ing together  into  a  speculative  whole.     This  is  particularly  true 
in  the  case  of  the  Holy  Spirit  as  the  "  third  Person  "  in  the 
Godhead. 

5.  Systematic  criticism  has  to  urge  the  following  objections: 
(a)   The  different  definitions  of  the  doctrine  have  not  been 
brought  to  inner  unity,  but  only  to  a  sort  of  equilibrium,     (b) 
The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  transcends  the  knowl- 
edge that  accrues  to  religious  faith  (i.  e.  our  understanding  of 
things  that  comes  from  revelation).     So  far  as  it  does  this  it 
dispenses  not  only  with  sure  ground,  but  it  alters  the  evangel- 
ical concept  of  faith  also.1 

Note  to  §51 :  5 

1.  It  makes  faith  an  assent  to  doctrines  that  are  not  intelligible  on 
the  basis  of  the  religious  life.  This  has  been  a  source  of  permanent 
weakness  in  Protestantism. 

If  you  were  to  blot  out  the  concept  "  world,"  it  would  accrue  to 
knowledge  again.  But  if  you  were  to  blot  out  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity,  would  faith  so  externalize  itself  again  in  the  modern  sit- 
uation ? 


100     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

6.  The  attempts  to  reconstruct,  or  restore  and  repristinate, 
the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  by  deriving  it  from 
the  Christian  consciousness,  or  by  speculative  construction  of 
a  metaphysical,  psychological  or  ethical  character,  neither  do 
justice  to  the  ecclesiastical  Trinitarian  dogma  itself,  nor  do 
they  have  convincing  power  in  themselves,  and  such  specula- 
tive attempts  have  no  right  at  all  on  the  evangelical  soil  of 
Christendom.1 

Note  to  §51 :  6 

1.  Given  the  redemption -experience,  what  God-idea  will  emerge? 

The  ecclesiastical  formula  has  done  injury  to  faith,  and  yet  it  would 
be  wise  to  keep  the  formula  for  pedagogic  purposes,  while  telling  what 
its  essential  and  true  meaning  is. 

Recognition  of  the  Holy  Spirit  as  a  person  other  than  the  person  of 
God  is  not  warranted  by  Scripture. 

Are  there  not  three  factors,  three  sides  to  the  divine  life?  There 
is  God's  life,  thought  of  as  in  psychological  form,  God's  self -revela- 
tion in  history,  and  God's  self-communication  to  the  spirits  of  men, 
and  especially  to  the  heart  of  his  child  (cf.  Pfleiderer,  Biedermann, 
Lipsius  and  Edward  Caird). 

§52.  The  Christian  Faith  in  God's  Word  and  Spirit. 

1.  The  criticism  in  §51  is  concerned  only  with  the  attempts 
to  gain,  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  a  disclosure  concerning 
the  relations  of  God's  inner  life   (opera  ad  intra},  not  the 
thoughts  of  faith  which  are  related  to  the  nature  of  God  re- 
vealed to  us  (v.   §50:  1  b).     Christian  faith  cannot  think  of 
God  whose  essential  content  is  disclosed  to  us  in  his  redemptive 
counsel  and  work,  (a)  in  rigid  exclusiveness,  or  (b)  in  far-off 
transcendence,  or  on  the  other  hand  (c)  in  natural  process  of 
emanation,  but  only   (d)   in  eternal,  personal,  living,  self-un- 
folding self-relation  to  the  world. 

2.  These  thoughts  of  faith  have  points  of  connection  with 
Biblical  views.1     (a)   The  Old  Testament  faith  in  God  appre- 
hended God's  self -re  veal  ing  essence  as  unfolded  in  many  ways 
and  therefore  formed  an  intuitive   (i.  e.   perceptual)    idea  of 
various  powers  belonging  to  God  and  proceeding  from  God, 
powers  by  means  of  which  God  entered  into  relation  to  the 
world    (cf.    "Angel   of   Jahweh,"    "God's   Name,"    "Glory," 
"  Spirit,"  "  Word,"  "  Wisdom  ").2     Yet  on  the  Old  Testament 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     101 

stage  these  ideas  retain  something  fluctuating.  In  part  also 
they  betray  the  background  of  older,  more  elementary  views 
of  divine  essences  and  forces,  or  they  become  artificial  supple- 
mentations of  a  later  abstract  God-idea,  (b)  But  the  New 
Testament  community  was  founded  on  the  unitary  revelation 
of  God  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  it  lived  in  the  certainty  of  a  com- 
munication of  the  divine  life  through  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  and 
the  formation  of  its  view  of  God  was  to  the  effect  that  God 
was  to  be  thought  (a)  as  exalted  above  the  world  and  ruling 
over  it,  yet  (ft)  always  in  connection  with  his  revelation  in 
Christ  and  his  self-communication  in  the  Spirit. 

Notes  to  §52 : 2 

1.  I  am  not  committed  to  the  following  with  any  steadfast  confi- 
dence in  it.     To  use  Scripture  to  support  a  position  commonly  means 
taking  the  metaphysical  and  psychological  elements  of  Scripture  and 
making  them  the  support. 

2.  Do  these  refer  to  inalienable  constituents  of  our  religion,  or  do 
they  belong  to  a  pre-Christian  stage  of  religion,  pointing  to  a  Media- 
tor between  God  and  man  ?     What  need  is  there  of  mediation  between 
Father  and  son  ?     It  does  not  follow  from  monotheism  that  mediation 
is  not  needed ;  but  from  the  Christian  view  of  God,  it  does. 

3.  God  is  holy  love  exalted  above  the  world  and  ruling  over 
it.     There  are  three  essential  moments  in  this  concept.     (Do 
they  justify  the  retention  of  the  term  "  Trinity  "  ?)      (a)   God 
is  "  God  the  Almighty  "  (Oeo<s  6  iravToxpaTwp),  who  as  "  Lord  of 
heaven  and  earth  "  is  "  Father  of  Spirits  "  (ira-typ  ™v  TTVCU/WTWV) . 
(b)  But  as  such  he  is  at  the  same  time  the  One  revealing  him- 
self in  time,  and  since  it  is  founded  in  his  eternal  being  to 
reveal  himself,  he  is  the  One  disposed  to  revelation  in  eternal 
living  self-determination.     Thus  he  is  "  God  the  Word  "  (0«6«  o 
Aoyos).      (c)   Moreover,  by  means  of  his  revelation  he  wills  to 
communicate  himself  at  the  same  time.     Thus  in  his  temporal 
operation,  which  is  founded  in  his  eternal  self-determination 
he  is  "  God  the  Spirit  "  (0eo«  TO  7rvev/ia). 

4.  These  are  the  three  moments  in  the  Christian  faith  in 
God,  and  it  is  also  true  (a)  that  not  one  of  them  may  be  swal- 
lowed up  by  the  other.     They  are  different  self-relations  of 
God  to  the  world,  each  of  importance  for  our  Christian  faith, 
(b)   They  may  not  be  separated  from  one  another.     They  not 


102     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

merely  emerge  successively  in  the  economy  of  salvation,  but 
they  are  co-existent  and  in-existent  as  self-determinations  of 
God.  In  this  regard  the  formula,  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  may  be  transferred  to  our  soil.1 

Note  to  §52 :  4 

1.  The  vital  essence  of  Trinitarianism  is  the  idea  of  world-uphold- 
ing holy  love,  with  its  self -revelation  in  history  and  its  self-communi- 
cation to  the  individual.  I  am  not  a  Unitarian,  but  the  doctrine  of 
three  persons  in  one  Godhead  is  mythology. 

5.  But  in  distinction  from  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity,  we  have  not  reached  thereby  three  hypostases,  but  only 
three  sides  (modes  of  operation)  of  the  Divine  Being  actively 
disclosing  himself.  At  all  events,  the  person  of  the  historical 
Jesus  Christ  has  a  hypostatic  self-dependence,  over  against 
God  as  Father,  and  so  has  the  community  of  the  ecclesia  which 
has  historically  arisen.  But  whether  and  in  what  sense  these 
self-dependent  historical  realities  are  to  be  understood  as  essen- 
tial relationships  of  the  eternal  essence  of  God  —  this  question 
leads  over  to  the  problem  of  the  pre-existence  of  Jesus  Christ, 
and  to  the  eternal  Election  of  the  Church. 


b.  GOD  AND  THE  FINITE  WORLD  IN  GENERAL. 
a.  God's  Relation  to  the  World  as  His  Creature  and  Instrument. 

§53.  The  Christian  View  of  God  and  the  Christian  View  of 
the  World.     (Division  of  the  Subject.} 

1.  We  have  tried  to  define  God's  essence  in  §§43  to  52,  only 
as  it  is  manifest  to  us,  therefore  in  its  relation  to  the  world.1 
But  the  task  remains  to  relate  the  actual  character  of  the  world 
to  God.  Hence  this  subdivision  b  concerning  the  character  of 
the  world  as  finite,  conditioned  and  legally  ordered.  It  is  all 
the  more  necessary  to  study  the  subject  since  the  Christian 
religious  view  of  the  world  and  the  scientific  knowledge  of  the 
world  touch  and  clash  in  so  many  points. 

Note  to  §53 : 1 

1.  We  are  concerned  with  the  functional  reality,  not  with  the  onto- 
logical  reality  of  God. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     103 

2.  The  world  in  its  natural  order  may  be  articulated  into 
the  Christian  faith  in  God  by  our  understanding  it  as  creature 
and  instrument  of  God.     Hence  in  a  we  shall  seek  to  deter- 
mine God's  relation,  in  /?  God's  attributes,  in  connection  with 
the  world  as  his  creature  and  instrument.     Under  a  we  shall 
deal  (aa)  with  the  doctrine  of  creation  and  preservation,  and 
(bb)  with  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  government  of  the  world, 
and  providence.     The  former  has  to  do  with  the  given  state 
of  the  world  as  grounded  in  God,  the  latter  with  its  progressive 
course  as  subject  to  the  divine  ends. 

3.  If  the  entire  part  b  relates  the  world  as  finite  to  God, 
or  considers  God  as  the  author  and  director  of  the  whole  nat- 
ural order  of  the  world,  the  task  will  fall  to  part  c  to  treat  the 
human   world  in   its  ethical   determinateness  within  the  em- 
pirically given  world,  and  to  determine  God's  moral  world- 
order  from  the  standpoint  of  the  Christian  faith.     There  are 
three  points  to  be  expounded  in  part  c,  viz.  a,  the  divine  des- 
tiny of  man ;  (3,  human  sin ;  and  y,  God's  relation  to  sinful  hu- 
manity. 

aa.  Creation  and  Preservation. 

§54.  The  Ecclesiastical  Doctrine  and  the  Biblical   View   of 
Creation  and  Preservation. 

1.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  creatio  offers,  mostly  on  the 
basis  of  Genesis  I,  definitions  concerning  (a)  the  Creator,  (b) 
the  concept  of  creation,  (c)  the  course  of  the  divine  creative 
activity,  (d)  the  end  of  the  creation  and  the  purposefulness  of 
the  created.     The  doctrine  of  preservation  (conservatio)  is  only 
the  extension  and  application  of  the  creation-concept  to  the 
present  state  of  the  world. 

2.  The  question  is  as  to  how  far  the  creation-doctrine  of 
Sacred  Scripture  is  true,     (a)   In  the  Old  Testament  the  two 
creation-stories  give  an  answer  corresponding  to  the  then  state 
of  knowledge,  to  the  knowledge-question  as  to  the  whence  of  the 
world;  but  they  form  only  the  introduction  to  the  redemptive 
history,  and  the  cosmological  material  itself  becomes  auxiliary 
means  in  order  to  the  answering  of  the  faith-question  as  to  the 
relation  of  the  world  and  of  man  to  God.     (b)   In  the  New 
Testament   the   Old   Testament  creation-faith   is   uncritically 


104     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

taken  over,  but  using  the  Old  Testament  conviction,  faith  in 
the  spiritual  new  creation  through  Christ  is  accentuated.  The 
natural  creation  is  brought  into  intimate  relation  with  that 
spiritual  creation  by  means  of  the  thesis  that  God  made  the 
world  through,  in  and  for  Christ,  and  elected  the  church  from 
the  foundation  of  the  world. 

3.  A  comparison  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  with  Biblical 
views  shows  (a)  that  of  the  religious  views  of  the  Scriptures 
the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  has  carefully  preserved  those  which 
are  found  in  the  creation  narratives,  and  which  in  the  history 
of  the  ancient  church  formed  a  line  of  demarcation  against 
ethicizing  perversions,  yet  has  not  known  how  to  employ  many 
thoughts  of  the  prophets,  and  especially  the  New  Testatment 
views,  in  a  really  living  manner.1     (b)   The  ecclesiastical  doc- 
trine has  sought  to  eternalize  the  natural  science  conceptions 
in  the  Old  Testament  along  with  its  religious  truths,  and  in 
this  way  has  brought  on  a  conflict  with  modern  natural  science.2 

Notes  to  §54:3 

1.  The  idea  of  will-less  emanation  is  not  Scriptural. 

2.  If  the  Genesis-story  were  blotted  out,  would  faith-knowledge  to- 
day say  that  the  world  was  made  in  six  days  ? 

4.  Modern  attempts  to  retain  the  view  of  nature  in  the  crea- 
tion narrative,  and  to  harmonize  that  view  with  present  nat- 
ural science,  go  to  pieces  on  the  historical  state  of  fact  of  the 
Old  Testament  text  itself,  and  these  attempts  do  not  fully  give 
to  natural  science  what  belongs  to  it;  but  above  all  else  they 
only  injure  the  religious  purity  of  the  Christian  faith  itself.1 

Note  to  §54 :  4 

1.  They  import  what  faith  does  not  create  and  cannot  use.  The 
time  was  when  theologians  could  not  discriminate  between  the  tem- 
poral, scientific  element  in  the  Genesis-stories,  and  what  was  of  eternal 
value  for  faith.  But  now  we  can  keep  the  faith  and  leave  the  imper- 
fect science.  Note  the  influence  of  the  question  as  to  the  essence  of 
faith.  We  are  now  excluding  from  faith  much,  to  have  given  up 
which  would  have  caused  panic  in  an  earlier  day. 

§55.  Systematic  Development  of  the  Christian  Tenets  Concern- 
ing Creation  and  Preservation. 

1.  In  the  Christian  doctrine  of  creation  we  are  concerned 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     105 

neither  with  a  scientific  nor  a  metaphysical  hypothesis  in  order 
to  an  explanation  of  the  existence  of  the  world,  but  with  a 
conviction  of  faith  regarding  the  end  and  ground  of  the  world. 
2.  Trusting  the  God  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  we  should 
become  personally  certain  of  the  following:  (a)  The  exist- 
ence and  constitution  of  the  material,  the  forces  and  the  laws 
in  the  world  are  not  the  highest  and  the  ultimate ;  but  absolute 
reality  is  God  alone  and  God's  kingdom.  Therefore  the  con- 
stitution of  the  world  as  a  whole  is  only  substratum  and  means 
for  the  absolute  end  of  God,  and  therefore  creature  and  instru- 
ment of  his  will.  Moreover,  the  existence  of  all  single  things 
in  the  world  is  not  only  conditioned  through  finite  causality, 
but  even  as  member  of  the  finite  causal  system,  is  determined 
by  God's  purposive  creative  will.  But  God's  creative  activity 
is  not  to  be  limited  to  a  single  past  act ;  it  is  to  be  apprehended 
as  an  eternal  relation  of  God  to  the  world,  controlling  the  entire 
course  of  time.1  But  (b)  on  the  basis  of  (a)  above,  this  de- 
pendence of  the  existence  and  constitution  and  course  of  the 
world  upon  God  is  to  be  more  sharply  defined  still,  («)  The 
world  is  neither  of  two  extremes,  viz.  emanation  on  the  one 
hand,  or  plaything  of  God  on  the  other ;  it  is  a  worthful  work 
of  his  creative  holy  love.  (/?)  As  such  it  is  founded  in  the 
self-revealing  and  self-communicating  God  or,  to  use  the  old 
phrase,  in  his  Word  and  in  his  Spirit,  (c)  Since  God's  pur- 
pose with  the  world  finds  its  full  realization  in  Jesus  Christ 
and  the  Christian  community,  Jesus  Christ  the  author  of  the 
spiritual  new  creation  and  Lord  of  the  Church  is  the  goal  of 
the  natural  creation  also.  The  world  is  created  "  unto  Christ," 
ets  Xpurrov.  Since,  however,  the  existence  and  constitution  of 
the  world,  or  its  right  to  exist  rests  only  in  its  supreme  spirit- 
ual end,  it  is  also  the  Christian  tenet  that  the  world  is  created 
and  consists  "in  Christ"  (ev  Xpiorw).  Does  the  world  exist 
"through  Christ"  (OM  Xpurrov),  as  the  New  Testament  says? 
That  can  be  determined  only  in  connection  with  the  question 
of  pre-existence  of  Christ 

Note  to  §55 :  2 

1.  What  is  the  function  of  creation-faith  in  the  religious  life?  (A 
topic  for  historical,  psychological,  and  constructive  theological  investi- 
gation.) 


106     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

3.  This  Christian  creation-faith  is  confronted  with  philo- 
sophic-religious views  of  the  world  of  a  different  tendency,  espe- 
cially with  the  pessimistic  and  the  aesthetic-pantheistic,  but  it 
has  room  for  the  relative  truth  of  these  views  also. 

§56.  Relation  between  the  Christian  Creation-Faith  and  the 
Present  Scientific  Picture  of  the  World. 

1.  It  is  not  the  function  of  the  Christian  creation-faith  to 
give  a  scientific  explanation  of  the  world  (v.  §55:  1),  but  it 
must  come  to  terms  with  the  world-picture  which  is  formed 
by  empirical  science  and  critical  philosophy,1  a  picture  which, 
however,  remains  problematic  in  many  points.  There  are  some 
questions  which  fall  to  be  considered  here,  as  follows : 
Note  to  §56 : 1 

1.  Dualistic  and  monistic  philosophies  may  come  and  go ;  idealistic 
and  materialistic  philosophies  may  come  and  go.     Critical  philosophy 
abides. 

2.  The  world  as  spatial-temporal  brings  us  face  to  face  with 
the  problem  as  to  whether  the  world  is  limited  or  unlimited  in 
space  and  time.     Philosophy  is  not  able  to  solve  this  prob- 
lem, but  lands  in  antinomy.     Hence  the  thought  of  the  critical 
philosophy  is  suggested,  that  our  whole  idea  of  space  and  time 
is  but  the  form  of  intuition  of  us  finite  limited  beings.     More- 
over the  Christian  creation-faith  gives  no  decision  of  the  prob- 
lem, but  may  be  in  harmony  with  either  side  of  that  antinomy. 
It  is  especially  compatible  with  the  above-mentioned  thought 
of  the  critical  philosophy. 

3.  The  world  as  stuff  leads  us  to  the  question  as  to  the  es- 
sence of  matter.     Different  conceptions  of  this  have  arisen.1 
Moreover  the  Christian  faith  in  God  leaves  this  open,  if  it  is 
only  acknowledged  that  this  our  material  world,  or  world  viewed 
as  material  is  indeed  (a)  presupposition  of  our  finitude,  but 
at  the  same  time  (b)  a  divinely  appointed  basis  and  material 
not  only  for  our  conduct,  our  moral  conduct  included,  but  also 
(c)  for  the  upbuilding  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 

Note  to  §56 :  3 

1.  Ostwald  and  Mach  are  inclined  to  throw  the  concept  "  matter  " 
overboard,  keeping  energy  as  the  category  which  sets  forth  what  is 
needed. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     107 

4.  Natural  science  has  led  to  reconstruction  of  the  geocentric 
picture  of  the  world,  which  underlies  the  creation-story.     Ex- 
tensive as  that  reconstruction  has  become  and  extraordinarily 
different  as  is  the  portrait  that  it  presents,  the  creation-faith 
receives  no  mortal  wound  at  this  point  either.     To  be  sure,  in 
the  light  of  the  degradation  of  the  earth  to  a  tiny  body  in  the 
system  of  the  world,  faith  cannot  contest  that  God's  eternal 
redemptive  will  may  extend  to  a  wider  scope  than  this  earth 
with  its  inhabitants.     Whether  one  or  myriad  populated  worlds 
be  in  need  of  redemption,  faith  can  and  must  maintain  at  the 
same  time  that  the  supreme  counsel  of  God  is  really  disclosed 
to  us  in  the  end  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  revealed  to  us  in 
Christ.     This  counsel  admits  an  extension  in  scope,  of  course, 
but  it  does  not  admit  of  being  surpassed  in  content,  according 
to- the  Christian  faith. 

5.  Present  science  seeks  a  developmental-theoretical  explana- 
tion of  the  present  formation  of  the  world,  especially  of  the 
present  biological  forms  of  the  organic  world.     And  the  Chris- 
tian creation-faith  is  opposed  in  principle  to  the  evolutionistic 
view  of  the  world,  whether  it  be  naturalistic  or  idealistic  or 
monistic.1     On  the  other  hand  it  leaves  the  investigation  of 
the  facts  of  development  in  the  different  regions  of  reality 
entirely  free.     Faith  only  requires  the  acknowledgment  that 
development  itself,   with   the  formations   proceeding  thereby, 
is  an  actualization  of  the  creative  divine  thought  of  an  end, 
and  must  serve  the  absolute  final  end  of  God. 

Notes  to  §56 :  5 

1.  Neither  causality  nor  teleology  in  the  Christian  sense  comes  to 
its  full  right  in  an  evolutionistic  metaphysics  of  the  Absolute.  It 
does  not  do  justice  to  the  idea  of  a  Will  as  the  ground  of  what  is,  or 
to  the  idea  of  an  end  consciously  set  up  and  being  realized.  It  drops 
back  to  a  substance-God,  a  sort  of  cosmological-ontological  God,  a 
nature-being,  rather  than  a  strictly  ethical  being.  Spiritualistic  evo- 
lution might  avoid  this  difficulty,  although  spirit  is  nature  of  a  higher 
order  and  behaves  in  a  nature  way.  In  Christian  creation-faith  the 
divine  causality  is  that  of  a  moral  will  and  purpose.  The  decisive 
problem  for  present-day  theology  is  that  of  the  relation  between  evolu- 
tionistic monism  and  the  historically  founded  revelation-faith.  De- 
velopment is  the  fact.  Evolutionistic  metaphysics  is  an  account  of 
the  fact  which  does  not  do  justice  to  divine  activity.  Our  position 
here  is  critical  monism  [in  Hb'ff ding's  sense  of  the  term]. 


108     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

bb.  The  Divine  Government  of  the  World,  and  Providence. 

§57.  The  Ecclesiastical  Doctrine  and  Biblical  View  of  God's 
Providential  Rule. 

1.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  providentia  goes   side  by 
side  with  the  doctrines  of  creatio  and  conservatio.     It  seeks 
(a)  under  the  concept  of  concursus  or  of  co-operatio  to  define 
the  causal  relation  of  God,  who  is  causa  prima,  to  the  actiones 
of  causae  secundae,  and  (b)  under  the  concept  of  gubernatio 
to  fix  the  teleological  direction  of  all  actiones  creaturarum  to 
God's  goal,  i.  e.  ad  fines  Dei.     The  material  of  the  doctrine, 
especially  of  (b)  above,  is  borrowed  from  Biblical  history,  es- 
pecially of  the  Old  Testament. 

2.  In  fact  the  Sacred  Scriptures  live  in  the  providence-faith, 
(a)   In   the  Old   Testament   it  underlies  the  whole  Biblical- 
historical  narrative  and  is  expressed  in  powerful  images  and 
pictures.     The  key  thereto  is  given  by  prophecy  especially, 
which  recognized  the  living  morally-ordered  providential  rule 
of  God  in  the  history  of  Israel,  but  also  of  other  peoples,  and 
which  interpreted  it.     Prophecy  gave  the  providence  of  God 
the  most  comprehensive  relation  to  happiness  and  unhappiness, 
to  natural  events  and  human  conduct,  especially  to  miracles  and 
to  every  day  occurrences.     Later  the  providentia  specialissima 
of   God    for   the    individual's    sake    is   emphasized.1      (b)    In 
the  New  Testament  (cf.  §47:  2)  Jesus  in  word  and  life  created 
a  still  stronger  basis  for  the  faith  that  God's  providence  ruled 
in  the  natural  world,  above  all  in  the  human  world,  and  in- 
deed not  simply  in  order  to  the  prosecution  of  his  counsel  in 
general,  but  also  in  order  to  the  true  salvation  of  the  individual 
children  of  God,  and  with  reference  to  their  need  and  their 
prayer.     On  the  basis  of  this  faith,  the  disciples  of  Jesus  have 
tried  to  understand  this  providential  rule  of  God  in  redemptive 
history  (oucoiw/u'a)  in  a  kind  of  religious  philosophy  of  history. 

Note  to  §57 :  2 

1.  Ecclesiastical  dogmatics  spoke  of  providentia  univcrsa,  providen- 
tia general-is,  providentia  specialis,  and  providentia  specialissima. 

3.  The  reformation  emphasized  again  these  religious  views 
of  the  Scriptures  in  their  full  practical  importance  over  against 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     109 

all  sorts  of  perversions.  Moreover  they  are  preserved  in  ec- 
clesiastical doctrine,  but  here  the  basis  of  the  faith  is  not 
properly  stated,  and  its  practical  importance  is  obscured  by 
its  schematic  elaboration.  Moreover  the  effort  is  smuggled 
in  to  decide  dogmatically  various  theological  questions  con- 
cerning the  way  in  which  God  as  causa  prima  works  upon 
causae  secundae.1 

Note  to  §57 :  3 
1.  Cf.  Pfleiderer's  discussion  of  concursus  in  his  Glaubenslehre. 

§58.  The  Ground  and  Content  of  the  Christian  Providence- 
Faith. 

1.  The  providence-faith  together  with  the  creation-faith  con- 
stitutes the  Christian  Weltanschauung,  or  world-view,  which 
corresponds  to  the  Christian  God-idea,  and  especially  to  the 
moment  of  that  idea  developed  in  §47.  As  in  the  creation- 
doctrine,  so  here  in  the  doctrine  of  providence,  the  point  is  as 
to  a  trustful  conviction  to  be  gained  in  personal  faith  in  Jesus 
Christ,1 

Notes  to  §58 : 1 

1.  Cf.  IT.  Schultz:  Old  Testament  Theology,  where  it  is  maintained 
that  providence-faith  arose  from  practical  needs,  not  speculatively. 

2.  This  conviction   includes   the  following  moments:     (a) 
The  basic  view  is  that,  as  with  the  constitution  of  the  world, 
so  with  all  process  in  the  world,  it  is  effectuated  according  to 
God's  will,  and  therefore  somehow  serves  the  supreme  end  of 
God.     (b)   The  most  important  application  of  this  faith  and 
the  test  of  its  vitality  is  the  conviction  that  all  things  must 
serve  our  salvation,  if  we  are  real  members  of  the  kingdom  of 
God ;  i.  e.  that  they  must  bring  God  inwardly  nearer  to  us, 
and  that  precisely  in  their  natural  causation  they  must  furnish 
the  material  for  our  activity  in  the  service  of  God.      (c)  In 
connection  with  this  supreme  goal  of  God  (in  its  relation  to 
the  community  and  the  individual)  the  single  events  or  proc- 
esses are  to  be  graded  as  more  or  less  remote  fore-stages  and 
means  for  that  goal.     The  result  is  the  thought  (a)  of  a  sys- 
tem of  divine  ends  of  a  higher  or  lower  order  governed  by  that 


110     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

supreme  end,  together  with  (0)  an  apparatus  of  means  in  order 
to  their  actualization. 

3.  The  complexity  and  immensity  of  this  system  of  ends 
makes  it  impossible  to  understand  aright  every  single  thing  in 
its  import  within  the  whole  world-plan  of  God.     It  is  on  this 
account  that  the  attempts  at  a  Christian  philosophy  of  history, 
still  more  at  a  Christian  philosophy  of  nature,  must  ever  re- 
main piecework.     In  particular,  within  the  limits  of  our  hori- 
zon we  are  able  to  harmonize  many  natural  events  —  for  ex- 
ample, natural  catastrophes  —  with  God's  providence  only  in- 
directly, with  the  thought  that  even  the  legal  order  of  the 
natural  process  through  which  such  events  are  brought  about 
is  a  necessary  presupposition  for  the  education  of  free  finite 
spirits.1 

Note  to  §58 :  3 

1.  We  do  not  know  enough  to  ascertain  the  divine  purpose  in  a 
given  catastrophe.  Seeking  to  give  comfort  by  explanation  is  conse- 
quently unsatisfactory,  although  the  temptation  to  do  so  when  dealing 
with  the  afflicted  is  nearly  irresistible. 

4.  But  with  all  the  imperfection  of  his  insight,  the  single 
Christian  in  his  providence-faith  may  and  should  be  free  from 
(a)  all  fear  of  chance  and  fate,  as  from  (b)  all  su. perstition. 
As  to  the  former,  God  is  conceived  too  deterministically ;  as 
to  the  latter,  too  capriciously.     In  the  practical  exercise  of  his 
providence-faith,  the   Christian  will  really  experience  in  his 
life,  step  by  step,  something  of  the  providentia  specialissima 
of  God.1 

Note  to  §  58 : 4 

1.  Providence-faith  would  not  survive,  if  we  could  not  revert  to 
special  providences  in  our  lives.  We  cannot  get  rid  of  providence- 
faith  religiously,  however  we  may  speculatively  agnosticize  it.  It  is 
a  conviction  of  faith.  You  cannot  compel  another  by  argument  to 
accept  the  view.  It  is  difficult  to  distinguish  between  a  conviction  of 
this  sort  and  superstition;  but  the  conviction  has  more  moral  worth 
for  the  life.  Superstition  is  essentially  pseudo-science;  faith  is  essen- 
tially religious.  But  the  religious  attitude  which  supposes  itself  to 
be  of  cognitive  value  as  regards  nature  or  history,  or  even  with  refer- 
ence to  God  as  an  object  of  knowledge,  is  superstition.  [The  influ- 
ence of  Hoffding  is  visible  here.] 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS      111 

§59.  Providence  and  Miracle.     Providence  and  Freedom. 

1.  Two  dogmatic  problems  arise  in  connection  with  an  ad- 
justment of  the  providence-faith  with  the  given  knowable  world, 
viz.  (a)  the  question  as  to  the  relation  of  providence  to  the 
natural  legal  order,  and  therewith  the  question  of  miracle; 
and  (b)  the  question  of  the  relation  of  providence  to  human 
freedom.1 
Note  to  §59 : 1 

1.  The  theological  problem  here  is  this :   Given  the  Christian  relig- 
ious faith,  what  thought  springs  out  of  it  concerning  the  relation  of 
God  to  the  world  and  to  his  children?     This  is  altogether  different 
from  proceeding  antecedently  to  determine  how  the  Absolute  is  con- 
nected with  these  contingent  and  relative  things.     Metaphysics  may 
have  such  a  function  as  to  solve  this  problem,  but  dogmatics  has  noth- 
ing to  do  with  it.     Is  religious  faith  true?     The  only  way  to  answer 
this  is  to  find  out  the  good  of  it  in  life. 

I  can  say  nothing  to  compel  the  assent  of  any  individual  to  belief 
in  special  providence,  if  he  does  not  hold  the  religious  standpoint. 
Still,  one  can  say  much  to  rationalize  the  doctrine  of  special  provi- 
dence. 

2.  A  regularity  or  legality  of  causal  relations  in  the  world 
is  already  observed  in  daily  life,  and  is  taken  into  account  in 
all  conduct  and  all  business.     In  a  much  more  comprehensive 
way  it  is  presupposed  by  science  and  actually  proved   in  a 
crude  scope,  but  it  is  just  on  this  account  that  the  question 
arises  as  to  whether  there  is  room  for  miracle  in  the  meta- 
physical sense,  i.  e.  room  for  such  events  in  case  of  which  by 
means    of   divine   encroachment    (a)    effects    are   intermittent 
which  should  follow  according  to  the  regular  order  of  things, 
or  (b)  effects  take  place  which  do  not  follow  from  the  natural 
connection. 

3.  This  question  does  not  admit  of  decision  from  the  stand- 
point of  science.     Science  cannot  contest  the  possibility  of 
metaphysical  miracle  on  the  one  hand,  but,  on  the  other  hand, 
science  in  its  particular  work  must  constantly  repeat  the  at- 
tempt (a)  to  articulate  all  natural  events,  even  the  most  inex- 
plicable, in  a  legal  system  of  nature,  and  (b)  to  understand 
in  their  psychological  motivation  the  spiritual  historical  events 
which  may  not  admit  of  explanation  according  to  universal 
laws. 


112      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

4.  Moreover,   even  from  the  standpoint  of  faith  in  Jesus 
Christ  we  do  not  attain  to  a  stringent  decision  of  the  meta- 
physical question  (cf.  §50:  1,  a).1     Of  course  the  conviction  is 
essential  to  the  Christian  faith  that  God's  work  is  free,  world- 
controlling,  and  in   so  far  a  living,   personal  work,     (a)  A 
new  spiritual  life  emerges  in  the  temporal  course  of  the  life 
of  the  individual  and  of  history,  by  virtue  of  such  divine  effi- 
ciency; (b)  and  such  divine  efficiency  has  regard  for  the  deeds 
of  man  and  the  prayer  of  the  children  of  God.     (c)  Finally 
such  divine  efficiency  is  able  to  bring  about  that  which  disap- 
points  all   expectations.     These   positions    of   faith,    however, 
since  the  relation  of  the  divine  efficiency  to  the  temporal  course 
of  the  world  is  impenetrable  (v.  §56:2),  cannot  decide  as  to 
how  far  in  the  case  of  such  events  (a)  a  later  creative  activity 
of  God  encroaches  into  the  created  world,  or   (b)   only  orig- 
inally created  potencies  or  forces  enter  into  temporal  manifes- 
tation for  us. 

Note  to  §59 : 4 

1.  The  God  who  would  change  water  into  wine  for  the  sake-  of  a 
wedding,  but  would  not  suspend  the  nature  of  fire  to  save  little  chil- 
dren from  being  burned  to  death  is  not  a  moral  God  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  modern  man,  and  there  is  no  use  in  trying  to  make  him 
believe  it. 

5.  Even  if  faith  must  leave  this  metaphysical  question  un- 
decided and  can  only  be  absorbed  in  the  thought  that  and  how 
far  all  process  in  the  world  serves  the  realization  of  the  holy 
and  gracious  will  of  God ;  yet  within  the  divinely  guided  proc- 
ess as  a  whole  single  processes  or  events  arise  as  specially  im- 
portant and  clear,  perhaps  also  as  specially  striking  and  power- 
ful disclosures  of  God's  agency.     These  are  signs  (ory/xeia),  or 
miracles  in  a  purely  religious  sense,1  i.  e.  such  events  are  able 
to  persuade  us  in  a  special  degree  of  God's  personal  care  for 
the  prosecution  of  his  redemptive  will  and  for  our  own  salva- 
tion, no  matter  whether  these  events  be  naturally  mediated  or 
not.     These    "  miracles "    become    understandable    for    us    in 
their  full  sense  ever  only  within  a  great  teleological  system  of 
redemptive  history,  or  within  our  own  life.     Otherwise  they 
remain  a  puzzling  mystery. 


SUPERSTEUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     113 

Note  to  §59:  5 

1.  It  is  metaphysically  dogmatic  to  affirm  either  the  possibility  or 
the  impossibility  of  miracles. 

6.  (a)  While  we  comprehend  thus  not  only  nature  but  also 
human  life  and  history  under  God's  providence,  we  subordi- 
nate and  subsume  the  free  acts  of  man  under  God's  providence 
also.  In  opposition  to  determinism,  as  also  to  an  exaggera- 
tion of  the  encroachments  of  freedom,  Christian  faith  lives  on 
the  certainty  that  God's  efficiency  does  not  repress  the  initia- 
tives of  human  freedom,  and  yet  does  constantly  keep  that  free- 
dom under  purposeful  guidance,  (b)  The  theoretical  ques- 
tion how  then  the  deeds  of  human  freedom  can  co-exist  with 
God's  all-conditioning  operation  and  be  kept  under  his  pur- 
poseful guidance  can  be  brought  to  a  decisive  solution  neither 
on  the  basis  of  Christian  faith  nor  in  a  metaphysical  way. 
The  various  attempts  at  solution,  e.  g.  self-limitation  of  the 
divine  prescience,  or  eternal  knowledge  of  the  acts  of  freedom, 
but  light  up  our  ignorance,  (c)  But  for  the  practical  reli- 
gious attitude,  the  reference  of  acts  to  human  freedom  and 
their  disposition  by  God's  providence  are  harmonized  without 
contradiction,  and  on  the  basis  of  this  practical  faith  we 
may  experience,  especially  in  our  own  redemptive  life,  some- 
thing of  the  fact  that  God's  guidance  and  our  freedom  co- 
exist.1 

Note  to  §59 :  6 

1.  This  treatment  of  miracles  does  not  transcend  the  limits  of 
dogmatics. 

§60.  The  Doctrine  of  Angels. 

1.  The  orthodox-ecclesiastical  dogmatics  has  united  the  doc- 
trine of  angels  with  that  of  creation  and  providence.     It  busied 
itself  to  gather  from  the  Scriptures  a  series  of  definitions  con- 
cerning the  existence,  the  essence,  the  condition  (morally  good 
and  bad),  the  activities,  and  the  rank  of  angels.     In  this  mat- 
ter it  passed  beyond  the  declarations  of  Scripture  itself,  and 
has  not  taken  into  account  the  historical  conditions  of  the  Old 
Testament  and  Xew  Testament  idea  of  angels. 

2.  In  the  Old  Testament  the  angel-faith  was  first  gradually 


114     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

formed  from  various  sources,  and  was  developed  not  without 
alien  influence,  and  was  thus  erected  into  an  essential  part  of 
the  picture  of  the  world.  As  such  the  angel-idea  was  taken 
over  into  the  New  Testament,  but  was  made  serviceable  to  the 
new  content  of  the  gospel.  It  imprints  the  living  power  of 
God  in  the  history  of  redemption,  his  providentia  specialissima 
for  his  people,  especially  for  the  "  little  ones  "  (/w/c/ooi).  It 
witnesses  to  the  spiritual  character  and  comprehensive  breadth 
of  the  kingdom  of  God. 

3.  Dogmatically  evaluated  this  content  hidden  in  the  angel- 
idea  (as  form)  seems  something  which  should  and  can  be  di- 
rectly certain  and  experienced  in  our  trust  in  Jesus  Christ. 
But  this  is  not  equally  true  of  the  angel-idea  itself.  The  latter 
concerns  the  form  in  which  the  divine  work  knowablc  in  faith 
is  consummated  over  against  the  world,  and  thus  touches  a 
region  withdrawn  from  the  direct  knowledge  which  accrues  to 
faith.  Also  from  the  standpoint  of  our  scientifically  changed 
picture  of  the  world,  doubts  arise,  not  against  the  thought  of 
spiritual  beings  and  spiritual  kingdoms  apart  from  us  men 
(v.  §56:4),  but  against  the  assumption  of  an  invasion  on  the 
part  of  angel-powers  into  the  natural  course  of  our  earth. 
(Natural  law  now  takes  the  place  of  angelic  agency  of  the 
olden  time.)  Thus  modern  theologians  are  accustomed  to  in- 
terpret and  employ  the  idea  of  angels  in  the  sense  of  a  poetic 
illustration  of  the  providence  of  God ;  but  —  and  this  is  the 
main  point  to-day  —  negation  of  angelic  mediation  or  efficiency 
must  not  be  permitted  to  jeopardize  the  full  vitality  of  the 
Biblical  providence-faith.1 

Note  to  §60 : 1 

1.  God  is  as  teleologically  concerned  in  the  life  of  man  as  was  indi- 
cated by  the  evangelical  providence-faith. 

ft.  God's  Attributes  in  connection  with  the  World  as  His  Crea- 
ture and  Instrument. 

§61.  Concept  and  Division  of  the  Attributes  of  God. 

1.  That  the  permanent  essence  of  God  revealing  himself  to 
us  is  displayed  in  the  relation  of  God  to  the  world  finds  its 
expression  in  the  propositions  concerning  God's  attributes.1 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS      115 

The  attributive  concepts  applied  to  God  designate,  but  ever  in 
comprehensive  expression,  the  various  constant  relations  of  the 
unitary  essence  of  God  to  the  world,  according  to  the  various 
sides  of  the  world.  They  set  forth,  therefore,  secundum  nos- 
trum concipiendi  modum,  the  single  indispensable  moments  in 
the  concept  of  God  as  holy  love,  exalted  above  the  world  and 
ruling  in  it.  We  can  only  approximately  interpret  to  our- 
selves (a)  the  riches  ("  glory  ")  of  the  revealed  God  through 
the  unfolding  of  these  moments,  and  (b)  his  inner  unity 
through  their  systematic  co-ordination. 

Note  to  §61 : 1 

1.  After  setting  forth  an  effect  of  God,  we  ask  what  attributes  are 
specifically  concerned  with  that  effect?     This  method  has  obtained 
since  Schleiermacher. 

2.  If  all  the  attributive  concepts  display  only  the  essence  of 
God  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  then  these  things  follow  there- 
from:    (a)   The  rejection  of  the  three  ways  taken  by  ecclesias- 
tical dogmatics  in  order  to  discover  the  divine  attributes,  viz. 
via  negationi-s,  via  eminentiae,  via  causalitatis.     They  turn 
aside  from  the  basis  and  standpoint  of  Christian  faith,  and  lead 
over  to  a  rationalistic  doctrine  of  God.      (b)   The  rejection  of 
various  traditional  attempts  at  division.     Especially  untenable 
is  the  division  into  attributes  of  separation  from  the  world 
and  attributes  of  relation  to  the  world  (transeunt  and  imma- 
nent), and  equally  untenable  the  division  into  static  (passive) 
and  dynamic  (active). 

3.  Corresponding    to    the    distribution    of    subject-matter 
sketched  in  §53,  we  have  to  exhibit  as  first  groups  the  attributes 
of  God  in  connection  with  the  finite  world  as  his  creature  and 
instrument,  i.  e.  the  attributes  of  eternity,  omnipresence,  omni- 
potence, omniscience,  goodness,  wisdom,  ever  according  as  in 
God's  creation   and  providence  we  have  in  mind    (a)    God's 
exaltedness  and  dominion  over  the  world  in  its  various  sides, 
or  (/?)  his  good  end,  or  (y)  suitability  to  this  end  of  his  activ- 
ity.    Then  in  a  second  group  we  set  forth  the  attributive  con- 
cepts which  designate  God  in  his  ethical  world-order,  especially 
in  his  relation  to  human  sin.     We  shall  deal  with  both  these 
groups  in  turn. 


116      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

§62.  Eternity  and  Omnipresence,   Omnipotence  and   Omnis- 
cience of  God. 

1.  The  unconditioned  exaltedness  and  dominion  of  the  heav- 
enly Father  over  the  world  finds  expression  in  the  concepts 
of  eternity  and  omnipresence,  of  omnipotence  and  omniscience, 
ever  according  as  the  temporality  or  spatiality  of  the  world,  its 
causal  determinateness  or  the  hiddenness  of  its  inner  connec- 
tions are  had  in  mind. 

2.  (a)   The  concept  of  the  eternity  of  God  does  not  desig- 
nate merely  the  beginninglessness  and  endlessness  of  his  exist- 
ence,    (b)  Also  the  thought  of  the  exaltedness  of  God  above 
all  that  is  temporal,  so  long  as  we  also  understand  it  only  as 
the  timeless  causality  conditioning  all  that  is  temporal,  remains 
an  essentially  speculative  idea,  never  attainable  fully  on  the 
part  of  thought.     As  against  these   (a  and  b)   the  Christian 
faith,  in  its  understanding  of  the  concept  of  eternity,  does  not 
first  emphasize  the  negative  and  causal,  but  the  positive,  ideo- 
logical relation  of  God  to  the  temporal  world.     The  eternity  of 
God  signifies  that  the  whole  time-series,  including  every  single 
point  in  that  series,  is  ruled  by  God's  steadfast,  unchangeable 
purpose,  and  that  in  so  far  God  is  "  King  eternal  "  (/3amA£V"> 
T&V  atwvwv).     From  this  practical  view  which  accrues  to  faith 
there  grows  the  intimation  that  God  is  not  bound  or  restricted 
to  our  finite  view  of  time  (v.  §56:2)  —  an  intimation,  however, 
which  can  never  become  real  knowledge  in  the  scientific  sense 
(v.  §50:  1,  a).     Above  all,  however,  the  life  and  prayer  of  the 
Christian  draw  from  that  certainty  of  faith  their  confidence, 
especially  in  the  face  of  a  dark  future.     The  superiority  of  the 
Christian  view  is  plain. 

3.  The  omnipresence  of  God  likewise  does  not  admit  of  be- 
ing speculatively  fathomed.  Christian  faith  rises,  of  course, 
to  the  intimation  that  the  world  does  not  present  itself  to  God 
in  the  spatial  form  of  intuition  in  which  it  appears  to  us  finite 
beings;  but  above  all  Christian  faith  affirms  the  practical  truth 
in  the  concept  of  the  omnipresence  of  God,  that  God  with  his 
holy  love,  judging  and  saving,  is  nigh  to  man  in  every  place, 
especially  to  his  own.1  The  inference  for  prayer  is  drawn  in 
John4:21-24.2 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     11? 

Notes  to  §62 :  3 

1.  How  different  the  significance  of  "  Thou  God  seest  me "  to  the 
martyr  and  to  the  guilty  soul. 

2.  Worship  is  to  be  "  in  spirit  and  in  truth."     Cf .  Tennyson :    "  The 
Higher  Pantheism." 

4.  In  the  concept  of  the  divine  omnipotence,  we  express  the 
faith  that  God  as  creator  and  pilot  of  the  world  is  able  to  do 
everything  which  corresponds  to  his  holy  and  gracious  will, 
and  can  employ  to  this  end  the  entire  causal  system  of  the 
finite  world.     In  the  Old  Testament,  still  more  in  the  New, 
the  concept  "  omnipotence  of  God  "  sustains  definite  relation 
to  God's  "  counsel,"  or  purpose ;  thus  the  concept  affirms  that 
God  is  able  to  save  and  to  perfect  his  kingdom,  and  with  this 
definition  of  the  concept,  the  insoluble  scholastic  questions  of 
a  former  day  drop  away.     The  rule  for  Christian  life  and 
prayer  which  flows  therefrom  may  be  found  in  Mark  14 :  35,  ff. 
Besides  the  "  all  things  are  possible  to  Thee  "  (-ravTa  8wara  <ro'i), 
we  should  ever  put  the  "  if  it  be  possible  "  («  Surarov  eamv). 

5.  Christian  dogmatics  cannot  shape  the  intimation  of  faith 
that  God's  cognition  is  above  human  cognition  to  a  psychology 
of  God.     Rather  in  the  concept  of  the  omniscience  of  God  in 
adhesion  to  the  Old  Testament  and  New  Testament  it  has  to 
lay  stress  upon  the  practical  religious  content,  viz.  the  convic- 
tion of  faith  that  even  the  innermost,  most  hidden  relations  of 
things  are  not  concealed  from  God's  holy  love,  and  especially 
that  this  is  true  of  our  own  innermost  thoughts  and  needs,  both 
of  our  sinful  emotions  and  of  our  spiritual  impulses. 

§63.  The  Goodness  of  God. 

1.  As  regards  the  concept  of  the  goodness  of  God,  present  usage 
has  been  fixed  essentially  by  the  influence  of  rationalism. 
God's  love  is  understood  thereby  in  its  relation  to  the  finite 
world  in  general,  therefore  not  merely  in  its  relation  to  the 
redemptive  goal  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  Therefore  the  con- 
cept sets  forth,  according  to  the  Christian  faith,  that  the  love 
of  God  extends  to  all  of  his  creatures,  and  discloses  itself  also 
as  regards  man  in  the  benefits  of  the  natural  life  as  well. 

2.  The  Old  Testament  and  New  Testament  give  points  of 
connection    for    this    enlargement    of    the   concept.     Still,    as 


118     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

against  a  sentimental  rationalistic  and  a  pantheistic  misinter- 
pretation of  the  thought  of  the  divine  goodness,  it  is  ever  to  be 
kept  in  mind  that  according  to  the  Biblical,  especially  the  New 
Testament,  view  the  concept  of  the  goodness  and  friendliness 
of  God  derives  its  firm  basis  and  inner  unity  from  God's  will 
to  save ;  hence  an  element  of  severity,  of  discipline,  of  pedagogy, 
is  in  the  concept,  and  God  shows  that  he  is  perfectly  good  and 
kind  by  creating  in  Christ  his  kingdom  as  the  supreme  good 
and  the  supreme  goodness. 

§64.  The  Wisdom  of  God. 

1.  The  wisdom  of  God  designates  comprehensively  the  per- 
fect teleology  of  the  divine  creation  and  the  divine  providence. 

2.  A  rationalistic  mode  of  apprehension  recognizes  the  wis- 
dom of  God,  above  all  (a)  in  the  rational  order  of  the  world, 
(b)  in  the  teleological  equipment  of  living  beings,  and  (c)  in 
the  constitution  of  nature  to  the  end  of  utility  for  man.     It  has 
only  found  its  aesthetic  transfiguration  (d)   in  the  pantheistic 
worship  of  the  harmony  of  the  world. 

3.  On  Christian  soil  it  is  certainly  justifiable  to  investigate 
God's  wisdom  in  the  natural  world,  as  this  is  done  even  in 
Old  Testament  passages.     But  according  to  the  Biblical,  espe- 
cially the  New  Testament  fundamental  view,  the  concept  of 
the  wisdom  of  God  receives  its  sure  foundation  and  clear  uni- 
tariness  first  through  its  relation  to  God's  unitary  final  end. 
The  wisdom  of  God  is  active  in  ways  known  to  faith,  yet  often 
hidden  to  faith,  in  order  to  the  realization  of  his  kingdom. 

4.  But  wisdom  of  God  finds  its  supreme  activity  and  verifi- 
cation as  pedagogic  wisdom  in  connection  with  human  sin. 
Thus  we  are  led  over  to  the  region  of  the  ethical  world-order 
in  which,  moreover,  all  the  attributes  above  designated  come 
into  play  likewise,  but  they  also  acquire  further  fulfilment  as 
to  their  content.1 

Note  to  §64: 4 

1.  Pfleiderer  maintains  that  the  ecclesiastical  view  of  a  dual  sta- 
bility of  the  good  and  the  bad  hereafter  must  yield  to  the  thought  of  an 
infinite  manifoldness  of  stages  and  forms  of  life,  in  which  the  infinite 
love  shall  have  room  to  display  its  wisdom  in.  pedagogic  activity  in 
further  maturing  of  moral  values. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     119 

C.    GOD  AND   THE   ETHICAL   WoBLD 

a.  The  Divine  Destiny  of  Man 

§65.  The  Doctrine  of  Ecclesiastical  Dogmatics  concerning  the 
Original  State  (Status  Integritatis) -1 

1.  Ecclesiastical  dogmatics  defines  the  natura  of  man  as  a 
divinely  created  essence  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other 
hand,  it  sets  forth  the  original  state  of  that  nature,  and  its 
subsequent  states.  Man  is  delineated  in  such  a  way  that  the 
essential  features  of  the  ideal  of  perfection  are  exhibited  in 
the  original  state  (stattis  integritatis) ,  or  more  accurately,  in 
the  imago  or  similitudo  Dei  concreate  in  man,  or  the  justitia 
originalis. 
Note  to  §65 

1.  See  Shedd's  History  of  Doctrine  and  Dogmatic  Theology  (under 
"  Anthropology  ")  ;  Hyde's  Social  Theology,  and  Watson's  Christian- 
ity and  Idealism. 

2.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  is  not  to  be  retained  in  this 
form,     (a)   It  requires  Biblical  criticism.     The  delineation  of 
the  original  state  of  the  first  man   (Genesis  2)   shows,  even 
apart  from  the  question  of  historicity,  no  state  of  ethico-religious 
perfection,1  and  the  concept  "  image  of  God  "  (Genesis  1)  has 
different  import  and  application  from  what  the  ecclesiastical 
dogmatics  makes  out  of  it.     But  also  in  the  New  Testament 
Christ's  appearance  by  no  means  signifies  a  mere  restitution  of 
that  which  was  in  the  beginning,  but  rather  a  perfection  of  the 
human  essence  for  the  first  time.     Christ  himself  is  the  first 
true  image  of  God,  the  embodiment  of  the  "  spiritual  man  " 
(dvtfpwTTos  Trvev/Mm/cds),  of  which  Paul  speaks,     (b)  At  the  same 
time  a  systematic  criticism  shows  that  an  actualization  of  the 
Christian  ideal  is  not  possible  as  concreate  state,  but  only  on 
the  soil  of  history.2     (c)   It  is  at  this  point  that  the  criticism 
on  the  point  of  the  history  of  dogma  sets  in  —  a  criticism  which 
exposes  the  rational,  historyless  character  of  that  doctrine.3 

Notes  to  §65 :  2 

1.  The  ecclesiastical  Adam  is  a  different  being  from  the  Biblical 
Adam.  The  ecclesiastical  Adam  is  a  construction  for  a  special  pur- 
pose, affiliated  with  .the  JBibJicaJ  Adain. 


120     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

2.  A  ready-made  moral  perfection  is  a  contradiction  in  terms  (see 
Kaftan's  DogmaiiTc  on  the  status  integritatis) . 

3.  Like  all  rationalism,  it  is  defective  historically. 

3.  In  this  ecclesiastical  doctrine,  however,  in  spite  of  a  false 
starting-point,  there  are  two  correct  questions  implicitly  put, 
yet  falsely  mixed  up  with  one  another,  (a)  What  is  the  di- 
vine destiny  of  man?  and  (b)  What  is  the  endowment  given 
to  man  in  order  to  attain  the  end  of  his  being?  Also  on  the 
basis  of  these  two  questions  a  series  of  correct  answers  is  given ; 
but.  they  at  bottom  burst  the  framework  of  the  old  doctrine. 
We  have  to  keep  the  two  questions  separate  and  clear,  and  take 
as  the  starting-point  of  their  answer,  not  the  Old  Testament 
delineation  of  the  original  state,  but  the  revelation  of  God  in 
Jesus  Christ. 


§66.  The  Christian  Propositions  concerning  the  Divine  Des- 
tiny and  Endowment  of  Man. 

1.  The  divine  destiny  of  man  that  we  grow  sure  of  through 
faith  in  Christ  is  one  that  is  valid  for  the  individual  as  well 
as  for  the  community,  (a)  The  supreme  destiny  of  the  indi- 
vidual man  is  divine  sonship,  or  inner  spiritual  likeness  to  Jesus 
Christ,  (a)  This  concept  signifies  both  the  religious  char- 
acter and  the  moral  character  that  we  ousrht  to  attain.  In  the 
actualization  of  this  goal  there  is  involved  at  the  same  time 
likeness  to  God  himself,  even  a  participation  in  the  divine  life, 
in  the  "glory"  (8o£a)  of  God.1  (/8)  These  two  establish  at 
the  same  time  a  position  of  freedom  and  of  dominion  over  the 
world.  All  this  leads  our  thoughts  from  the  destiny  of  man 
beyond  the  limits  of  this  earthly  existence  to  an  eternal  con- 
summation.2 (b)  The  supreme  destiny  of  humanity  is  desig- 
nated by  the  concept  kingdom  of  God,  and  by  the  concept 
ecclesia  as  well.  These  two  concepts  are  related  to  each  other. 
They  involve  at  least  the  union  of  men,  on  the  one  hand  in 
prayerful  faith  and  confession,  on  the  other  in  mutual  love 
and  in  the  dwelling  of  God  in  the  human  community.  This 
kingdom  of  God,  like  the  individual,  also  awaits  transcendent 
consummation.  The  two  sides  (a  and  b  above)  are  so  connected 
that  only  by  the  two  together,  i.  e.  in  the  consummation  of  the 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     121 

individual  and  in  the  consummation  of  the  community,  can  the 
image  of  God  be  entirely  presented. 

Notes  to  §66 : 1 

1.  In  the  last  analysis  it  is  God-likeness  for  which  we  ought  to  care. 
This  is  true  even  in  imitation  of  the  spirit  of  Christ. 

2.  The  idea  of  the  consummation  in  perfection  of  the  individual  is 
immanent  and  constant  in  our  Christian  religion  in  all  its  true  ex- 
pressions. 

2.  Guided  by  this  knowledge  of  the  goal,  dogmatics  has  to 
designate  the  divinely  ordained  endowment  in  order  to  the  ful- 
filment, or  to  the  attainment  of  this  goal.1  (a)  The  divine 
endowment  of  the  individual  man  lies  in  the  tendency,  essential 
and  inalienable  to  man,  to  inner  unity  and  freedom,  above  all 
in  the  endowment  of  conscience  (that  is  to  say,  in  the  question 
essential  to  man,  as  to  a  unitary  norm),  and  in  the  religious 
endowment  (that  is  to  say,  in  the  desire  for  true  blessedness, 
which  becomes  religious  receptivity  in  connection  with  the  expe- 
rience of  human  limits  and  in  the  light  of  divine  revela- 
tion). Along  with  these  endowments  common  to  all  men  there 
are  individual  talents,  or  gifts,  through  which  each  man  is 
distinguished  from  all  the  rest ;  and  these  talents,  or  gifts,  con- 
stitute the  basis  for  the  special  divine  destiny,  or  for  the  voca- 
tion to  be  fulfilled  by  each  man.  (b)  A  divinely  ordained  en- 
dowment of  humanity  for  the  kingdom  of  God  consists  in  this, 
that  the  natural  community  of  blood  and  interest  yields  the 
basis  for  a  morally-regulated  spiritual  communion  (v.  §20:  2), 
and  that  also  the  higher  activities  of  the  human  spirit,  espe- 
cially the  moral  and  religious  (v.  §§7  and  31),  tend  to  form 
communities.  But  all  these  endowments  attain  their  develop- 
ment first  through  history  and  the  formative  force  ruling  in 
history. 

Note  to  §66 : 2 

1.  The  essence  of  man,  from  this  point  of  view,  is  not  his  cognitive 
bent,  but  his  striving  forward  to  a  goal.  In  the  Christian  estimation 
of  man,  the  moral  is  central. 

3.  If  the  propositions  of  faith  expounded  in  1  and  2  above 
be  perfectly  maintained,  then  the  apparently  insoluble  metar 
physical  question  as  to  the  nature  of  the  psychic  essence,  and 


122      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

as  to  the  mode  of  its  emergence  or  procession  from  the  natural 
and  the  historical,  may  be  open  for  investigation.1 

Note  to  §66 :  3 

1.  Faith  is  interested  in  maintaining  that  God  sets  man  a  goal,  and 
that  he  gives  him  sufficient  endowment  to  enable  him  to  reach  that 
goal.  And  these  are  precisely  the  positions  which  anthropology  and 
psychology  need  not  assail. 

4.  Also  the  natural  science  question  as  to  the  first  entrance 
of  man  into  the  series  of  creatures  can  be  relegated  to  empirical 
natural  science  investigation,  if  it  be  only  borne  in  mind  that 
a  higher  teleological  thought  of  God,  and  therewith  a  higher 
stage  of  creation,  is  actualized  in  man  as  compared  with  the 
rest  of  creation.  Equally  so  the  question  as  to  the  original 
state  of  man,  as  to  particulars,  is  a  subject  for  historical  (an- 
thropological) investigation.  The  only  important  thing  for 
faith  is  that  the  initial  stage  of  man  shall  be  held  to  be  such 
as  that  a  normal  further  development  towards  the  highest  goal 
of  his  destiny  shall  be  possible.  But  this  last  thesis  is  a  con- 
clusion from  the  Christian  view  of  sin. 

/£.  Human  Sin. 

aa.  The  Essence  of  Sin  and  the  State  of  Sin  of  the  Individual 
and  Humanity. 

§67.  The  Doctrine  of  Sin  in  Ecclesiastical  Dogmatics. 

1.  The  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  sin  is  built  throughout  on 
the  doctrine  of  the  original  state,  and  therefore  is  dominated 
by  the  concept  of  "original  sin"  (peccatum  originate}.1  In 
particular  (a)  the  peccatum  originate  originans  is  defined  as  to 
cause,  course  and  result ;  (b)  the  peccatum  originate  originatum 
is  defined  in  its  essence,  its  mode  of  propagation,  its  relation 
to  nature  and  to  guilty  character;  (c)  the  stages  and  degrees 
of  peccata  actualia  are  defined ;  and  (d)  the  whole  state  of  man, 
burdened  with  hereditary  sin,  is  defined  in  relation  to  liberum 
arbitrium. 

Note  to  §67 : 1 

1.  What  belief  is  logically  possible  is  determined  by  the  funda- 
mental world-view.  In  a  fixed,  static  world,  the  only  way  anything 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     123 

new  can  get  in  is  by  cataclysm.     Having  begun  with  an  "original 
state,"  there  had  to  be  a  "  fall,"  to  account  for  later  developments. 

2.  This  ecclesiastical  doctrine  requires  a  critical  evaluation 
in  its  character  as  a  whole,  but  also  in  these  special  points  indi- 
cated above.  With  reference  to  1,  d,  above:  It  is  correct  that 
the  natural  man,  i.  e.  humanity  untouched  by  the  spirit  of 
Jesus  Christ  (and  the  same  is  true  of  its  individual  members), 
has  not  ability  for  the  fulfilment  of  perfect  good  as  goal.  But 
the  exaggerated  emphasis  of  this  truth  does  not  sufficiently 
take  into  account  man's  capacity  and  yearning  for  redemption, 
and  the  great  relative  diversity  of  unredeemed  men  and  groups 
of  humanity.1  With  reference  to  1,  c,  above:  To  be  sure  a 
gradation  of  guilt  must  be  rightly  acknowledged  in  the  doc- 
trine of  peccata  actualia.  But  this  doctrine  is  drawn  up  ac- 
cording to  a  different  criterion  from  the  sinful  state  in  gen- 
eral, and  it  deteriorates  into  an  atomistic  treatment  of  single 
acts  of  sin.2  With  reference  to  1,  b,  above:  Over  against 
this  the  thought  of  a  unitary  power  of  sin  persisting  from  gen- 
eration to  generation  is  justified  throughout.  But  the  working 
out  of  this  doctrine  apart  from  its  Biblical  criticism  and  its 
criticism  on  the  basis  of  the  history  of  dogma  is  also  exposed  to 
the  systematic  judgment  that  the  concept  of  a  hereditation  of 
guilt  is  untenable,  and  that  the  derivation  of  this  sinful  con- 
tinuity, or  system,  or  connection,  from  only  physical  heredity 
is  likewise  one-sided.  With  reference  to  1,  a,  above:  The 
ecclesiastical  doctrine  is  based  throughout  on  Genesis  3.  But 
there  is  the  question  as  to  the  original  meaning  and  historicity 
of  this  narrative. 

Notes  to  §67 :  2 

1.  Autosoterism  does  not  take  into  account  the  efficiency  of  Divine 
and  of  social  life  in  man's  salvation. 

2.  This  position  landed  in  casuistry  in  Roman  Catholicism. 

3.  This  criticism  leaves  the  task  (a)  to  establish  the  criterion, 
concept  and  fact  of  sin,  and  to  do  so  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  Christian  faith  itself,  and  according  to  the  logic  of  that 
faith  (§68) ;  (b)  to  make  intelligible  the  unitary  power  of  sin 
in  us  and  around  us  (§69)  ;  and  (c)  to  bring  the  gradation  of 
guilt  into  harmony  with  (a)  and  (b)  above  (§70). 


124     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

§68.  The  Criterion,  Concept  and  Fact  of  Human  Sin. 

1.  The  following  points  of  view  are  regulative  for  a  Chris- 
tianly  determined  knowledge  of  sin.  (a)  Although  an  em- 
pirically given  fact,  sin  also  is  to  be  established  in  its  character 
as  sin,  only  as  a  faith- judgment  in  which  the  given  is  evaluated, 
not  only  as  anti-ethical,  but  at  the  same  time  as  anti-divine.1 
(b)  For  Christian  faith  the  criterion  of  this  judgment  can  only 
be  the  divine  destiny  of  man  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ 
(£00:  1).  Sin  is  any  inclination  of  will,  act  of  will,  or  social 
order  issuing  from  the  human  will,  that  is  contrary  to  this 
divine  destiny  of  man.  (c)  The  application  of  this  criterion 
in  particular  is  complicated  by  the  fact  that  this  supreme  di- 
vine destiny  has  not  been  manifest  everywhere  and  at  all  times 
in  humanity.  Therefore  it  is  to  be  applied  directly  only  in  the 
self-valuation  of  the  Christian,  and  in  the  valuation  of  that 
which  passes  as  Christian,  i.  e.  historical  Christianity,  espe- 
cially. It  is  only  indirectly  valid  for  pre-  and  extra-Christian 
humanity.  There  sin  is  all  that  is  in  contradiction  to  the  will 
of  God  already  revealed  at  the  given  stage,  and  therefore  in 
contradiction  to  the  supreme  divine  destiny  of  men  to  which 
this  stage  of  revelation  is  preparatory. 

Note  to  §68 : 1 

1.  Strictly  scientific  ethics  has  not  a  word  to  say  concerning  "  sin." 
The  doctrine  of  sin  is  a  faith-judgment. 

2.  The  more  accurate  fixation  of  the  content  of  the  concept 
of  sin  flows  from  comparison  with  this  supreme  divine  destiny 
of  man.      (a)  Above  all,  sin  on  its  religious  side  is  to  be  un- 
derstood as  perversion  of  the  right  relation  to  God.     (b)  But 
at  the  same  time  on  its  moral  side  sin  is  to  be  apprehended 
(a)  as  seZ/-surreuder  to  impulse  and  inclination,  or  as  lack  of 
self-discipline  and  self-control,  and  (/8)  as  egoistic  regardless- 
ness  and  lovelessness  toward  the  neighbor.     This  apprehension, 
especially  the  prominence  given  to  the  religious  side,  corre- 
sponds to  the  New  Testament,  and  it  was  also  emphasized  in 
the  great  Reformation  movement.1     So  far,  moreover,  as  fel- 
lowship of  men  with  God  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other 
the  overcoming  of  the  animal  nature  (<™/j£)  and  the  regard  for 
the  neighbor,  are  revealed  and  recognized  as  goal  in  all  the  pre- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     125 

liminary  stages  of  development,  a  corresponding  determination 
of  the  content  of  sin  is  applicable  in  those  regions  also.2 

Note  to  §68 :  2 

1.  Today  sin  is  regarded  too  exclusively  in  its  ethical  as  against  its 
religious  aspect 

2.  The  growth  of  the  idea  of  sin  must  keep  pace  with  the  growth 
of  revelation. 

3.  On  the  basis  of  this  criterion  and  this  content  of  the  con- 
cept of  sin,  we  have  the  thesis  of  the  universality  of  sin  in  hu- 
manity,    (a)   This  thesis  can  be  founded  only  on  this  expe- 
rience and  that  of  others.     To  be  sure,  witnesses  are  to  be 
examined  from  the  pagan  world,  from  the  Old  Testament  and 
New  Testament  and  from  the  history  of  Christianity,     (b) 
This   widened   experience,   however,   leads  to  this  thesis.     It 
testifies  not  only  to  a  wide  distance  between  man  and  the  per- 
fect goal  of  his  destiny,  but  also  to  a  lagging  behind  the  rela- 
tive religious   and  moral   knowledge   reached   at   the   various 
stages.     It  testifies  further  not  only  to  a  doing  of  sinful  deeds 
by  each  man,  but  to  a  great  sinful  system  within  the  individual 
man  and  within  humanity. 

§69.  The  Grounds  of  the  Power  of  Sin  in  Us  and  around  Us. 

1.  In  the  life  of  the  single  man  there  exists  a  great  system 
and  complex  of  sin.  (a)  This  rests  on  the  one  hand  on  a 
unitary  root  of  all  the  single  acts  of  sin.  (a)  Actually  there 
is  in  every  man  a  multiplicity  of  impulses  and  inclinations 
which  are  given  by  nature  and  contain  no  regulative  norm  in 
themselves,  (ft)  In  the  temporal  development  of  the  human 
ego  the  foundation  of  these  impulses  and  inclinations  («n0v/u<u) 
outstrip  the  rise  in  consciousness  of  religio-ethical  norms.  A 
decision  of  the  will  in  favor  of  the  latter  (i.  e.  the  religio- 
ethical  norms)  can  be  effected  later,  therefore,  only  in  and 
through  conflict  with  the  still  unbridled  impulses  and  inclina- 
tions. There  the  impulse-life,  or  the  <rdp€,  is  a  source  of  con- 
stant temptation  to  sin.  (y)  Any  yielding  of  the  willing  ego 
to  the  l-mOvfiiai  in  contradiction  to  the  already  revealed  religio- 
ethical  norm  is  vere  peccatum.  It  is  an  expression  of  a  "  mind- 
ing of  the  things  of  the  flesh  "  (ra  T^S  o-apKos  <£pa>veiv)  and  be- 


126      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

comes  as  deed  a  "  fulfilment  of  the  desire  of  the  flesh  "  (firi6vp.iav 
crap/cos  TcAeiv).  (8)  The  inborn  iiriBv^iai  are  at  first  only  nat- 
ural endowment  which  may  be  favorable  or  unfavorable  in  va- 
rious degrees  to  the  ethical  life  (v.  2,  c,  below).  But  they  be- 
come sinful  passions  in  the  degree  that  we  let  them  rule  us  in 
contradiction  to  the  known  will  of  God,  and  thus  from  being  a 
state  of  nature  they  come  to  be  a  state  of  actual  sin.  This  last 
distinction  can  be  joined  on  to  certain  Scriptural  thoughts,  along 
with  which,  however,  other  views  exist  side  by  side.1  At  all 
events  it  is  a  necessary  distinction  from  inner  grounds,  (b) 
The  consistency  or  complex  or  order  of  sin  referred  to  above  is 
founded  on  the  other  hand  on  the  results  arising  from  every 
sinful  deed.  It  is  not  simply  that  inner  consequence  and  the 
power  of  outer  circumstances  drive  us  steadily  to  further  single 
acts  of  sin,  but  the  decision  of  will  itself  establishes  a  tendency 
to  repetition,  and  finally  a  bent  to  sin,  and  therewith  a  slavery 
of  the  will.  This  becomes  irremediable  completely  when  it  is 
at  the  same  time  combined  with  bluntedness  of  conscience. 

Note  to  §69 : 1 

1.  Ethical  pessimism  and  dualism  appear  in  the  Scriptures,  and 
were  inherited  by  Paul. 

2.  There  exists  a  system  of  sin  much  greater  still  within  hvr 
man  society.     It  is  intelligible  from  the  following  considera- 
tions:    (a)  Every  sinful  act  can  also  itself  become  a  tempta- 
tion to  sin  to  fellow-men  (a/cavSaAor),  be  it  (a)  through  enticing 
example,  or   (ft)   through  compensation  of  evil  with  evil,  or 
(y)  through  confusion,  or  aberration,  or  sophistication  of  the 
weak  conscience,     (b)   The  anti-ethical  views,  principles,  tend- 
encies which  are  endured,  formed,  strengthened,  or  increased 
by  the  individual  in  intercourse  with  his  fellow-men,  but  espe- 
cially in  pedagogic  activity,  found  and  established  a  dominion 
of  sin  for  the  contemporaneous  and  subsequent  life  of  man. 
(c)  Finally,  it  is  confirmed  by  sociological  observation  that  an 
abnormal   strength   of  single   impulses   and   inclinations,   and 
therewith  a  disposition  to  special  sins,  is  transferred  by  means 
of    physical    hereditation.     These    observations    suggest    the 
thought  that  we  all  share  in  some  measure  in  such  hereditary 
burden. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     127 

3.  All  these  experiences  specified  above  may  be  summed  up 
in  a  kingdom  of  sin  (cf.  the  concept  KO<T/UOS).  This  concept, 
which  is  more  comprehensive  than  that  of  hereditary  sin,  makes 
the  universality  of  sin  affirmed  in  §68:  3  understandable. 

§70.  The  Guilt  of  Sin  and  the  Stages  of  Sin. 

1.  On  the  basis  of  our  previous  exposition,   the  following 
concepts  are  to  be  discriminated,      (a)  Points  of  connection, 
constituting  the  ground  of  the  possibility  of  sin,  are  the  natural 
cVt0v/uot  belonging  to  the  essence  of  man  (v.  §69: 1,  a).     They 
are  positive  endowment  to  sin  or  inborn  inclination  to  sin  only 
so  far  as  they  appear  in  abnormal  strength  on  account  of  the 
hereditary  burden  (v.  §69:  2,  c).      (b)   Sins  themselves  are  all 
tendencies  of  will,  acts,  and  states  arising  from  activity  of  the 
will,  which  objectively  considered  contradict   (a)   the  will  of 
God  already  known  at  the  given  stage,  and  therewith  (/8)  the 
actualization  of  the  divine  destiny  of  humanity   (v.   §68:  1). 
(c)   Sin  is  guilt  only  in  so  far  as  sin  is  subjective  contradiction 
on  the  part  of  the  person  against  that  will  of  God  of  which  the 
person  is  himself  conscious,  a  contradiction  arising  from  full 
self-determination. 

2.  The  relation  between  sin  and  guilt  may  be  more  accurately 
defined  as  follows:     (a)   In  the  case  of  every  man  there  are 
such  sins  as  are  not,  or  at  least  not  entirely,  his  own  guilt,  but 
are  referable  or  traceable  to  the  guilt  of  others,      (b)   As  re- 
gards society  at  large  it  follows  from  this  that  all  sin  is  some- 
how caused  by  its  members.     There  is  a  fellowship  of  human- 
ity in  guilt,  in  which  every  one  is  enmeshed  in  sin  through 
the  guilt  of  others,  but  becomes  also  in  turn  guilty  of  the  sin 
of  others.     This  view  is  to  be  substituted  for  the  impossible 
concept  of  hereditary  guilt. 

3.  Within  this  sin-  and  guilt-fellowship  there  are  the  most 
diverse  gradations  of  sin  and  guilt,  both  in  the  case  of  indi- 
viduals and  of  groups  of  society.     The  highest  degree  of  guilty 
sin  is  the  conscious  fundamental  and  definitive  resistance  of 
the  revealed  and  known  perfect  will  of  God  (blasphemy  against 
the  Holy  Spirit).     Where  this  perfect  will  of  God  is  not  yet 
entirely  revealed  and  known  (ayi/oia),  and  where  in  consequence 
that  definitive  decision  has  not  yet  been  made  in  this  world 


128     CHRISTIANITY  IX  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

or  in  any  other  world,  sin  is  still  forgivable,  however  diverse 
the  degree  of  guilt  may  be. 

bb.  Sin  and  Evil. 
§71.  The  Evil  Embedded  in  Sin  Itself. 

1.  That  sin  constantly  entails  evil  is  the  abiding  teaching  of 
ecclesiastical  dogmatics.     The  connection  between  sin  and  evil 
is  fixed  in  the  concept  of  punishment,  as  we  shall  now  proceed 
to  show. 

2.  By  evil  in  general,  an  injury  to  man  in  his  personal  life 
and  its  ends  is  understood.     It  follows  from  the  propositions 
concerning  the  divine  destiny  of  man  that  as  a  fact  sin  itself 
carries  with  it  the  supreme  evil.     For  sin  in  its  essence  is 
separation  from  filial  communion  with  God  and  exclusion  from 
true  eternal  life.     In  the  guilt-feeling  as  a  state  to  be  imputed 
to  man,  and  as  lowering  his  person,  man  becomes  conscious  of 
his  separation  from  God  and  from  the  true  goal  of  his  own 
life.     But  this  separation  exists  as  supreme  evil,  even  when 
the  guilt-feeling  is  blurred  —  indeed  in  this  case  is  all  the 
more  remediless  (cf.  §69:  1,  b). 

3.  The  concept  of   punishment   is   rightly   applied   to   this 
separation  from  God.     (a)   There  are  systematic  reasons  for 
this,     (a)   The  concept  "  punishment "  is  borrowed  from  the 
region  of  right,  and  signifies  in  this  region  a  painful  diminu- 
tion of  rights,  which  causally  considered,  is  inflicted  by  civil 
authority  upon  the  transgressor,  and  ideologically  considered 
is  designed  to  bring  the  damnatory  judgment  concerning  the 
transgression  to  expression,  and  to  protect  the  civil  order  it- 
self.    (/3)   Of  course  the  divine  destiny  of  man  to  the  king- 
dom of  God,  and  therein  to  divine  sonship,  does  not  found  a 
legal  relation   (relation  of  right)  between  him  and  God,  but 
the  realization  of  that  destiny  or  the  enjoyment  of  filial  right 
with  God  is  dependent  upon  ordered  religio-ethical  conditions. 
Therefore  even  under  the  causal  point  of  view  the  concept  of 
punishment  is  applicable.     The  concept  signifies  a  diminution 
or  abrogation  of  the  right  of  divine  sonship,  which  ensues  as 
result  of  transgression  of  those  ordered  conditions,     (y)   Cor- 
responding to  the  religio-ethical  destiny  of  man  the  teleological 


SUPEKSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     129 

point  of  view  is  also  applicable,  only  the  purpose  of  punish- 
ment is  not  simply  protection  of  the  order  of  right,  but  either 
the  leading  of  the  transgressor  himself  to  his  divine  destiny 
(i.  e.,  pedagogic  punishment),  or  the  carrying  through  of  the 
divine  end  (i.  e.  the  kingdom  of  God)  over  against  those  who 
resist  God's  order  (i.  e.  judicial  punishment),  (b)  Also  the 
view  that  the  separation  from  God  embedded  in  sin  is  not  only 
supreme  evil  but  also  the  peculiar  punishment  of  sin,  has  his- 
torical right,  the  knowledge  that  this  punishment  does  not  lie 
in  any  sort  of  outer  result  of  sin,  but  in  remoteness  or  aliena- 
tion from  God  himself,  has  its  beginning  in  the  Old  Testament. 
It  dominates  the  conception  of  the  New  Testament  also  (cf. 
the  concept  of  "  death  "  in  the  New  Testament),  and  it  was 
powerfully  set  forth  by  all  the  reformers.  It  is  conserved  in 
ecclesiastical  dogmatics,  but  not  consistently  worked  out  there. 

§72.  Sin  and  Outer  Evil 

1.  The  question   arises  whether   outer  evil    (i.  e.   the  hin- 
drances which  we  meet  in  our  endeavor  after  natural  goods, 
after  life,  health,  possession,  honor)  is  to  be  viewed  as  punish- 
ment of  sin. 

2.  The  first  thing  to  be  observed  as  to  this  question  is  that 
the  concept  "  evil,"  according  to  the  general  definition  given 
in  §71:  2,  ever  has  a  subjective  side.1     (a)   Pain  and  suffering 
become  evil  for  me  only  in  the  measure  that  they  are  an  injury 
to  my  personal  life  and  end  (or  purpose),     (b)  The  degree 
in  which  the  evils  befalling  man  are  felt  by  him  as  injurious 
evils  depends  upon  his  moral,  still  more  upon  his  religious  atti- 
tude.    While  suffering  is  for  the  man  who  surrenders  himself 
to  the  world^  who  lives  without  God,  a  disturbance  of  the  hap- 
piness of  his  life,  a  disturbance  which  seems  to  be  due  («)  to 
a  malicious  chance  or  fate,  or  (j8)  to  the  mysterious  and  mel- 
ancholy lot  of  finitude,   and  while  suffering  is  for  the  man 
separated  from  God  by  the  guilt-feeling  a  judgment  of  God, 
it  is  for  the  Christian  reconciled  with  God  a  dispensation  of 
the  fatherly  love  of  God.     (c)   This  diverse  apprehension  of 
suffering  is  not  mere  subjective  illusion,  but  divine  order  as 
well.     In  particular  it  is  divine  punishment  (a)  that  one  fet- 
tered by  earthly  goods  should  experience  suffering  as  most 


130     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

grievous  evil,  and   (ft)   that  one  estranged  from  God  should 
experience  suffering  as  divine  judgment. 

Note  to  §72 : 2 
1.  Is  what  we  feel  to  be  evil  objectively  evil  and  meant  to  be  evil  ? 

3.  But  it  is  another  question  as  to  whether  apart  from  this 
subjective  side  the  outer  fortune  of  suffering  on  the  part  of  the 
individual  is  to  be  considered  as  punishment  of  his  sin.  (a) 
If  we  inquire  on  the  one  side  (cf.  §71 :  3,  a,  a,  /?)  as  to  a  causal 
connection  between  the  sin  of  the  individual  and  the  suffering 
that  comes  to  him,  it  is  a  fact  that  such  connection  can  be  estab- 
lished in  many  cases,  but  it  is  also  a  fact  that  such  connection 
cannot  always  be  established.  The  degree  of  every  suffering 
falling  upon  one  depends  in  part  upon  entirely  different  cir- 
cumstances. Indeed  one  brings  down  a  special  measure  of 
suffering  upon  oneself  through  special  fidelity  in  the  service 
of  God.1  (b)  On  the  other  hand  (cf.  §71:3,  a,  a,  y)  if  we 
consider  the  divinely  ordered  purpose  or  end  of  suffering,  suf- 
fering at  all  events  can  be  (a)  a  penal  judgment  brand-mark- 
ing and  destroying  sin ;  but  it  can  also  serve  an  entirely  differ- 
ent purpose,  especially  (/?)  the  beneficent  education  and  purifi- 
cation of  the  sufferer,  hut  also  (y)  the  revelation  of  the  power 
of  God  and  of  Christ  to  gird  us,  as  well  as  (8)  blessing  to 
other  men.2 

Notes  to  §72 : 3 

1.  The  supreme  illustration  of  this  is  the  death  of  Jesus.     Note  its 
historical  inevitableness.     Given  Jesus  and  the  tradition  and  spirit  of 
his  environment,  and  the  cross  was  inevitable.     It  is  an  instance  of 
the  tragic  law  of  the  world-order  itself.     The  bearer  of  the  higher 
ideal  falls  a  victim  to  the  vulgar  reality  about  him.     Individual  life 
here  and  there  rises  to  a  higher  altitude  of  spiritual  ideality  and  work. 
The  collective  life  on  a  lower  level  rises  up  and  surges  against  this 
higher  life.     It  feels  the  condemnation  involved  in  the  presence  of  the 
higher,  and  resents  it.     Those  who  push  out  an  inch  beyond  the  mul- 
titude are  likely  to  be  crucified  in  one  way  or  another.     But  by  their 
fall  they  enrich  the  life  which  destroys  them.     This  is  a  law  of  prog- 
ress itself.     (See  F.  W.  Robertson's  sermon  on  the  text,  "  It  is  expedi- 
ent that  one  man  should  die  for  the  nation.")     And  the  children  of 
those  who  killed  the  prophets  subsequently  built  the  prophets'  tombs. 

2.  See  the  article  by  Daab,  entitled  "  Die  Seele  Jesu,"  in  a  recent 
number  of  Das  Suchen  der  Zeit. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     131 

4.  The  decision  of  3  above,  concerning  the  suffering  of  the 
individual  still  leaves  the  question  open  as  to  whether  the  total 
collective  suffering  in  the  world  has  come  into  the  world  in 
consequence  of  human  sin  in  general.  (Query:  Was  the  suf- 
fering antecedent  to  human  sin,  and  to  the  existence  of  man 
even,  anticipative  consequence  of  sin?)  (a)  This  causal  con- 
nection (a)  can  be  affirmed  at  least  of  a  part  of  suffering,  (/8) 
but  it  may  not  be  assumed  as  to  the  sufferings  of  man  flowing 
from  the  natural  order,  that  they  subsequently  came  into  this 
world  on  account  of  human  sin.  (b)  Why,  then,  is  the  order 
of  suffering  in  the  world  ?  *  To  this  question  the  answer  in  a 
teleological  sense  may  be  given:  on  account  of  sin.  That  is, 
God  has  ordained  and  arranged  for  suffering  in  the  world 
created  by  him  as  a  finite  world,  because  this  world  was  to 
serve  as  the  place  for  the  education  of  a  humanity  that  had 
fallen  into  sin. 

Note  to  §72 : 4 

1.  This  is  not  unlike  the  question  asked  by  a  child,  "  Why  is  there 
anything  at  all?" 

§73.  The  Doctrine  of  Satan. 

1.  The  orthodox  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  found  the  ultimate 
cause  of  all  sin  and  of  all  evil  in  Satan.1  In  the  doctrine  of 
Satan,  which  forms  a  part  of  angelology  (cf.  §60: 1),  it  sought 
to  collect  the  Scriptural  disclosures  concerning  the  essence,  biog- 
raphy and  work  of  Satan  and  of  wicked  angels.  But  in  this 
matter  the  relation  between  the  work  of  Satan  and  the  sending 
of  evil  by  God,  remained  in  uncertainty,  fluctuation,  ambiguity 
and  suspense,  in  the  ecclesiastical  dogmatics.  The  limits  of 
Scriptural  declaration,  moreover,  were  transcended.  Depend- 
ent upon  Holy  Writ,  it  was  yet  wise  above  what  was  written. 
The  historical  conditions,  also,  of  the  Satan-idea  in  the  Scrip- 
tures were  not  taken  into  account. 
Note  to  §73 : 1 

1.  This  is  the  way  orthodoxy  gets  its  optimism. 

2.  In  the  Old  Testament  the  idea  of  Satan  and  demons  as 
well  as  that  of  angels   (cf.   §00:2)   was  gradually  developed 
from  different  starting-points  indeed,  and  also  under  alien  in- 


132      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

fluence  in  part,  and  was  erected  to  an  inalienable  constituent 
of  the  picture  of  the  world  of  that  time.  As  such,  it  was  taken 
over  into  the  New  Testament,  even  by  Jesus  himself.1  It 
must  serve  only  this  end,  however,  viz.  (a)  to  express  the  great 
opposition  between  the  kingdom  of  God  and  the  fearful  king- 
dom of  sin  and  of  the  evil  connected  with  sin;  (b)  to  strengthen 
faith  in  the  overcoming  of  God-opposed  spiritual  powers  through 
Jesus  Christ,  and  (c)  to  spur  the  believers  in  Jesus  Christ  on 
to  earnest  conflict  and  indefatigable  watchfulness. 

Note  to  §73 : 2 

1.  It  does  not  follow,  because  a  personality  shared  a  world-view  now 
antiquated,  that  that  personality  is  not  incomparably  nobler  than  ours 
may  be  with  a  more  accurate  view  of  the  world.  (See  the  chapter  on 
"  The  Kingdom  of  God  "  in  Kenan's  Life  of  Jesus.) 

3.  Dogmatically  evaluated  (cf.  §60:3),  this  practical  reli- 
gious content  of  2  above,  embodied  in  the  Satan-idea,  seems 
to  be  something  which  should  and  can  be  directly  certain  to  us, 
and  experienced  by  us  through  faith  in  Jesus  Christ.  But  this 
is  not  equally  true  of  the  idea  or  form  of  a  personal  Satan 
and  his  demons.  That  idea  is  (a)  partly  the  pictorial  expres- 
sion for  the  grim  fact  of  human  sin  and  human  evil,  (b)  partly 
an  explanation  of  what  is  believed  beyond  the  region  of  the 
direct  knowledge  which  accrues  to  faith.  But  this  explanation 
is  no  longer  convincing  to  us,  for  on  the  standpoint  of  our 
scientifically  changed  picture  of  the  world,  scruples  arise  against 
the  assumption  of  a  real  encroachment  of  Satan  and  of  demonic 
powers  into  our  life.  In  addition  their  relation  on  the  one 
hand  to  the  inframundane  bearers  and  forces  of  moral  evil,  on 
the  other  hand  to  God's  dominion  and  rule,  remains  ever  unex- 
plained and  unclear.  Thus  it  is  advisable  to  employ  (cf. 
§69:  3)  the  Satan-idea  only  in  the  sense  of  a  pictorial  compre- 
hensive expression  for  the  kingdom  of  sin  with  its  mysterious 
dominion.  It  is  important  to  add,  however,  that  whoever  fol- 
lows this  suggestion  must  be  all  the  more  watchful  that  to  him 
nothing  of  the  full  seriousness  of  the  Biblical  apprehension  of 
sin  shall  be  lost.1 

Note  to  §73 : 3 

1.  In  giving  up  old  concepts  there  is  danger  of  giving  up  their  vital 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     133 

content.  It  seems  that  the  modern  man  must  give  up  the  Satan-con- 
cept, but  not  the  Satan-content.  Can  one  similarly  give  up  the  Bib- 
lical-ecclesiastical God-idea  and  save  the  God-content? 

y.  God's  Relation  to  Sinful  Humanity, 
aa.  God's  Dominion,  or  Rule,  in  Relation  to  Human  Sin. 
§74.  God's  Decree,  or  Purpose,  and  Human  Sin, 

1.  The  last  sections,  with  their  use  of  the  concept  "  punish- 
ment," already  passed  over  to  the  view  which  accrues  to  faith, 
as  to  God's  relation  to  human  sin.     Still,  faith  in  God's  provi- 
dential dominion  (v.  §§57  to  59)  must  be  related  to  the  facts 
of  sin  more  comprehensively.     The  universal  question  is  this, 
viz.,  How  far  is  sin  to  be  included  in  God's  decree,  or  purpose  ? 

2.  The  reformers  in  connection  with  predestination  thoughts 

(a)  referred  sin  partly  to  God's  arrangement  directly,  but  yet 

(b)  affirmed  the  guilt  of  man  at  the  same  time.     The  reformed 
or  Calvinistic  dogmatics  emphasized  the  former,  i.  e.  (a)  above. 
The  Lutheran  or  Arminian  dogmatics  emphasized  the  latter, 
i.  e.   (b)  above,  and  sought  to  avoid  not  only  the  idea  of  sin 
as  a  metaphysical  necessity,  but  also  the  idea  of  any  author- 
ship of  sin  on  the  part  of  God. 

3.  In  the  system   of   Christian   dogmatics   two   apparently 
contradictory  propositions   are  to   be   introduced,     (a)   Since 
we  through  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  are  inwardly  persuaded  of 
our  guilt  before  God,  it  is  implied  already  in  this  fact  that  we 
must  stop  at  the  decision  of  our  own  will  as  ground  of  our  con- 
tradiction to  God,  that  sin,  therefore,  cannot  be  derived  from 
the  will  of  God.     (b)   But  since  we,  through  faith  in  Jesus 
Christ,  become  certain  of  the  creative  activity  and  providence 
of  God,  we  must  affirm  at  the  same  time  that  sin,  resisting  the 
will  of  God,  is  not  simply  excluded  from  his  decree,  or  pur- 
pose.    God  founded  the  possibility  of  sin  in  his  creative  order. 
He  also  founded  there  equally  structurally  the  possibility  of 
overcoming  sin.1     Sin  is,  however,  all  the  time  subject  to  his 
providential  rule. 

Note  to  §74 :  3 

1.  The  moral,  the  good,  the  remedial  is  as  original  structural  and 
initial  as  the  opposite.     There  is  original  grace. 


134     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

4.  The  question  now  is  as  to  how  these  two  theses  (a  and  b 
above)  are  to  be  combined  and  harmonized,  (a)  Of  course 
it  is  impossible  for  us  to  make  intelligible  through  causal  ex- 
planation on  the  basis  of  the  relation  of  God  to  finite  spirits, 
at  once  their  contradiction  to  God  and  their  dependence  upon 
God.  (b)  Yet  by  way  of  an  ever  imperfect  teleological  the- 
odicy we  may  understand  so  much  at  least,  viz.  (a)  that  the 
possibility  of  a  sinful  decision,  a  decision  against  God,  is  neces- 
sary presupposition  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  a  kingdom  of 
free  moral  persons;  (ft)  that  the  development  of  sin,  once  be- 
gun, is  the  condition  of  its  being  really,  inwardly  overcome; 
(y)  that,  in  addition,  in  a  series  of  special  cases,  human  sin 
must  directly  serve  the  execution  of  the  divine  will. 

§75.  God's  Judicial  and  Pedagogic  Guidance  and  the  Goal  of 
His  Ethical  World-Order. 

1.  According  to  the  previous  section  the  development  of  sin 
is  no  unrestricted  development.     But   as   Christians   we   are 
certain  of  a  dominion,  or  rule,  of  God,  mighty  and  abounding 
over  sin,  of  a  dominion  limiting  and  judging  sin.     We  know 
this  from  the  fact  (a)  that  the  guilt-feeling  is  given  in  and  with 
sin,    (b)    that  the  order  of  suffering  in  the  world   operates 
against  the  unbridled  dominion  of  «ri0u/uai;    (c)   that  within 
human  society  the  works  of  sin  contain  the  germ  of  the  disso- 
lution of  sin;  and  (d)  that  finally  the  power  of  moral  evil  is 
often  broken  by  outer  judgments. 

2.  With  this  judging  and  limiting  power  a  pedagogic,  there- 
fore a  positive,  counteraction  on  the  part  of  God  is  interwoven. 
Already  in  his  judgment  upon  sin,  God  is  at  the  same  time 
active  in  order  to  the  education  of  the  sinner ;  but  God's  posi- 
tive, pedagogic  work  is  directly  disclosed  in  the  establishment 
of  the  religio-ethical  endowment  of  man   and   humanity    (v. 
§66:  2),  as  well  as  in  the  dominion  of  God  in  history,  bring- 
ing that  endowment  to  its  unfolding.     This  dominion  of  God 
is  specially  manifest  (a)  in  outstanding  historical  occurrences, 
and   (b)   in  prophetic  personalities  through  which  a  gradual 
uplift  to  religious  and  moral  knowledge  takes  place;  and  in 
special  measure  this  is  to  be  recognized  on  the  soil  of  the  Old 
Testament,  in  the  redeeming  guidance  of  Israel,  and  in  prophecy 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     135 

and  in  law.  All  this  points  yet  again  to  the  supreme  positive 
counteraction  of  God  against  human  sin,  i.  e.  to  the  redemp- 
tion that  is  in  Jesus  Christ. 

3.  Therefore  the  supreme  points  of  view  for  the  understand- 
ing of  God's  historical  order  of  the  world  are  not  juridical,  but 
ethical.  It  is  not  an  order  of  right,  i.  e.  a  legal  order,  for  this 
would  be  guided  by  the  ultimate  principle  of  retribution.  It 
is  an  order  of  education,  i.  e.  a  pedagogic  order  in  which  inner 
and  outer  punishment  serves  either  the  emancipation  of  the 
individual  from  sin,  or  also  the  consummation  of  the  kingdom 
of  God  as  a  whole  (cf.  §71 :  3,  a,  y  and  §72 :  3,  b). 

bb.  God's  Attributes  in  Kelation  to  Human  Sin. 
§76.  In  General. 

1.  God's  relation  within  his  ethical  world-order  (according 
to  §61:  3),  no  less  than  God's  relation  to  the  finite  world,  is  to 
be  apprehended  in  a  series  of  attributive  concepts.     To  be  sure 
all  the  attributes  of  God  specified  in  §§62  to  64  appear  in  force 
in  his  ethical  world-order,  and  seem  here,  as  it  were,  only  po- 
tentiated through  their  relation  to  human  sin.     Add  now  to 
these  the  attributive  concepts  which  move  only  in  this  relation. 
But  they  too  are  mere  unfoldings  of  the  unitary  divine  essence 
of  God  as  holy  love,  exalted  above  the  world  and  ruling  over 
the  world. 

2.  The   anthropopathic  character  which   cleaves   and   must 
cleave  to  these  attributive  concepts  in  special  measure  is  to  be 
evaluated  according  to  the  principles  enunciated  in  §49 : 4  and 
§50:3. 

3.  The  division  of  attributes  of  this  group  can  repose  on  the 
distinction  set  forth  in  §75. 

§77.  The  Attributes  of  God  cm  Judging  Sin. 

1.  A  first  series  of  attributes  of  God  follows  from  God's  holy 
love  which  excludes  all  sinful  reality  from  its  fellowship.  This 
side  of  holiness  (cf.  §48 :  4,  a)  may  be  best  brought  to  ex- 
pression in  the  concept  of  the  earnestness  of  God.  A  more 
frequent  designation  for  this  is  the  concept  "  jealousy "  or 
"  zeal "  of  God,  which  in  the  Old  Testament  expresses  the 


136      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

energy  of  the  disposition  and  of  the  conduct  of  God  against 
his  foes  and  for  his  chosen  people ;  in  the  New  Testament  sense, 
however,  the  energy  of  the  will  and  work  of  God,  which  is 
directed  to  the  sanctification  of  the  community  and  its  mem- 
bers and  the  removal  of  all  unholiness  from  them. 

2.  Closely  akin  to  this  concept  is  the  other  concept  of  the 
wrath  of  God,  which  expresses  less  a  permanent  attribute  of 
God  than  a  mode  of  relation  under  definite  circumstances. 
While  in  the  Old  Testament  the  concept  "  wrath  of  God  "  is 
never  entirely  freed  from  the  characteristic  of  vindictiveness 
and  precipitate  rashness,  and  thus  while  an  unmediated  oppo- 
sition exists  between  wrath  and  grace,  we  yet  have  to  designate 
the  wrath  of  God  corresponding  to  the  whole  tendency  of  New 
Testament  views  as  the  judicial  reaction  of  the  unitary  holy 
love  of  God,  ever  consistent  with  itself  against  human  sin. 
It  cannot  reach  its  culmination,  however,  prior  to  the  close 
of  temporal  development.  Still  even  now  it  discloses  itself 
as  an  operative  power  within  human  history. 

§78.  The  Attributes  of  God  as  Redeeming  Sinners. 

1.  A  second  series  of  the  attributes  of  God  results  from  this, 
viz.  that  God's  love  as  holy  rebounds  against  sin  indeed,  but 
confronts  the  sinner,  not  yet  definitive  in  his  choice  of  sin, 
as  a  redeeming  and  pedagogic  love.  This  faith  is  expressed 
in  the  designations  of  God  as  longsuffering  and  patient,  as 
merciful  and  gracious,  (a)  The  first  two  concepts  (long- 
suffering  and  patience),  in  direct  relation  to  God's  judging 
activity,  express  the  faith  that  the  God  revealed  in  Jesus 
Christ  (a)  gives  sinful  humanity  time  and  opportunity  to  re- 
pent, and  (/8)  allows  sin  fully  to  ripen  in  sinful  humanity, 
before  he  pronounces  his  definitive  judgment,  (b)  The  last 
two  concepts  (mercy  and  grace),  in  direct  relation  to  God's 
redeeming  activity,  express  faith  in  a  God  who  not  only  delays, 
but  who  turns  in  seeking  love  himself  to  sinners  (v.  Luke  15). 
(a)  Mercy  of  God  is  interpreted  in  the  Old  Testament  in  part 
as  compassion  with  man's  weakness  and  mortality;  according 
to  New  Testament  views  it  is  founded  upon  the  ethical  need 
of  man  and  directed  to  man's  eternal  redemptive  goal.  (/8) 
The  concept  grace  is  the  specific  expression  for  God's  love  so 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     137 

far  as  it  redeems  the  sinner  without  his  merit.1  But  in  the 
New  Testament  the  concept  designates  less  an  attribute  of  God 
than  God's  active  relation  to  sinners  and  God's  gift  to  them, 
especially  of  the  forgiveness  of  sin  and  the  sanctifying  power 
flowing  from  that  gift. 

Note  to  §78:1 

1.  This  is  an  expression  of  the  supreme  morality  of  God. 

2.  The  concept  faithfulness  of  God  especially  emphasizes 
in  God's  holy  love  the  thought  that  that  love,  when  once  in 
operation,  persists  in  its  redemptive  purpose  both  as  regards 
the  individual  and  humanity,  in  spite  of  human  sin  and  hu- 
man  unfaithfulness.     This   perseverance    of   God    in   his   re- 
vealed counsel  comes  to  be  of  necessity  judicial  exclusion  with 
reference  to  those  who  definitively  persist  in  opposing  it  (v. 
II  Timothy  2:  12,  13). 

§79.  The  Combination  of  the  Two  Series  of  Attributes  as  re- 
gards Human  Sin. 

1.  Even  more  than  the  concept  of  faithfulness  of  God,  that 
of  divine  righteousness  is  a  connecting  link  between  the  two 
series  of  attributes  treated  in  §§77  and  78.     (a)  Already  in 
the  later  period  of  the  Old  Testament  the  righteousness  of  God 
is  recognized  above  all  in  this,  viz.  that  in  judicial  act,  it  de- 
stroys the  foes  of  his  chosen  people  and  therewith  pronounces 
his  justifying  judgments  upon  the  latter  themselves.     And  in 
the  New   Testament  in  the  idea  of  God's  righteousness  the 
thought  is  prominent  that  it  announces  itself  in  the  justification 
of  the  believing  sinner  (v.  Romans  3:23).     (b)  Accordingly 
it  is  best  for  dogmatics  not  to  limit  the  concept  "  righteous- 
ness "  to  primitive  righteousness,  but  to  conceive  it  in  such  a 
way  that  God's  forgiveness  toward  the  believer,  as  well  as  his 
judgment  upon  the  obdurate,  may  be  derived  therefrom.     This 
is  possible,  best,  if  in  adhesion  to  the  widest  concept  of  the 
New  Testament  itself,  the  attribute  of  God  be  understood  as 
righteousness  by  means  of  which  he  founds  and  maintains  the 
whole  ethical  order  of  the  world. 

2.  But  it  is  not  only  in  a  single  concept  that  the  bond  between 
the  two  series  of  attributes  is  to  be  seen.     The  apparent  ten- 


138      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

sion  between  the  two  series  is  resolved  by  the  knowledge  that 
the  single  attributes  are  never  to  be  isolated,  but  are  to  be 
understood  as  moments  of  the  one  holy  love  of  God  (v.  §48:  4), 
which  is  active  in  a  unitary  world-order  for  the  actualization 
of  its  supreme  supramundane  end  (v.  §75:3).  This  activity 
of  the  one  holy  love  of  God  in  all  its  moments  must  be  set 
forth  in  the  doctrine  of  redemption  through  Jesus  Christ,  known 
in  dogmatics  as  the  doctrine  of  the  person  and  the  work  of 
Christ.  To  that  subject  we  next  turn. 


B.    GOD  AND  JESUS  CHRIST  THE  LORD. 

(THE  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  PERSON  AND  WORK  OF 

CHRIST,  OR  CHRISTOLOGY  AND  THE 

DOCTRINES  OF  GRACE.1) 

a.  THE  PBOBLEM  OF  DOGMATIC  CIIEISTOLOGY  AND  THE  WAY  TO 
ITS  SOLUTION. 

a.  The  Problem,  Especially  in  Relation  to  the  Biblical  Material. 

§80.  What  the  Biblical  Material  is,  and  its  Worth  for  Our 
Task. 

1.  In  the  development  of  all  the  previous  propositions  of 
faith,  Jesus  Christ  was  the  ground  of  the  knowledge  which 
accrues  to  faith,  and  the  key  to  the  world  of  faith.1  But  since 
he  is  also  object  of  the  knowledge  that  accrues  to  faith  and  him- 
self an  essential  member  of  the  world  of  faith,  Christian  dog- 
matics  has  for  its  task  to  determine  the  place  of  Jesus  Christ 
in  this  reality  of  faith.2 

Note  to  B. 

1.  As  representing  different  approaches  to  the  Christological  prob- 
lem the  following  works  may  be  consulted :  Shedd's  Dogmatic  Theol- 
ogy and  Strong's  Systematic  Theology;  John  Caird's  Fundamental 
Ideas  of  Christianity;  Edward  Caird's  Evolution  of  Religion;  Pfleid- 
erer's  Glaubenslehre,  Philosophy  of  Religion,  and  Philosophy  and  De- 
velopment of  Religion,  J.  Watson's  Christianity  and  Idealism;  Hyde's 
Social  Theology;  Troeltsch's  History  of  Protestant  Theology;  the 
theological  works  of  Dorner  and  Martensen,  and  W.  N.  Clarke's  Out- 
lines of  Christian  Theology;  Kaftan's  Dogmatik;  Schultz's  Evangel- 
ische  Glaubenslehre;  Kriiger's  Die  Christliche  Dogma  der  Dreieinig- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     139 

keit,  etc.,  and  recent  books  and  articles  by  Wrede,  Baumgartner,  Bous- 
set,  Hollman,  Wobbennin,  Jiilicher,  Teichmiiller,  et  al. 

Notes  to  §80 : 1 

1.  How  does  the  Christian  think  of  God?    What  is  the  Christian 
relation  to  God?     It  is  determined  by  the  personality  of  Jesus.     God 
is  the  sort  of  being  for  whom  Jesus  could  conscientiously  be  prophet. 
Jesus  is  the  ground  and  source,  the  guarantee  and  determinant  of  the 
Christian  view  of  God. 

2.  Is  Jesus  Christ  indispensable  to  the  Christian  faith,  or  is  he  of 
only  incidental  importance  in  the  world  of  faith  ?     Is  he  like  a  school- 
master, leading  us  to  God,  and  then  abdicating?     Or  does  he  belong 
centrally,  inalienably  and  abidingly  to  Christian  faith? 

Has  not  Jesus  become  a  troublesome  factor  in  Christian  thought? 
Take  the  miracle-stories,  for  example. 

2.  The  ultimate  basis  of  the  solution  of  this  task  is  to  be 
found  in  one  group  of  the  Biblical  material,  viz.  the  narratives 
concerning  Jesus  Christ.     That  group  consists  of  two  parts: 
(a)   It  sketches  a  portrait  of  the  character  of  Jesus  (Charak- 
terbild).     (b)   It  reflects  the  self -witness  of  Jesus  in  the  unity 
of  his  teaching  and  of  his  work.     The  material  which  fur- 
nishes the  ultimate  basis  for  the  solution  of  our  problems  is 
to  be  found  in  these  two  things. 

3.  The  harmonious  content  of  the  picture  of  his  character 
and  of  the  self-witness  of  Jesus  is  illustration  and  elucidation 
on  the  one  hand  of  the  full  humanity  and  on  the  other  hand 
of  the  divine  Messianic  dignity  of  Jesus.     But  the  latter  re- 
ceives its  profound  interpretation  in  this,  viz.  that  it  rests  on 
Jesus'  own  personal  filial  relation  to  God,  and  finds  its  essen- 
tial content  in  his  Savior-service  to  men.1 

Note  to  §80:3 

1.  Did  Jesus  think  he  was  the  Messiah?  The  primitive  church 
thought  he  was  anyway,  and  their  writings  seem  to  make  clear  that  he 
thought  he  was.  But  in  the  New  Testament  it  is  hard  to  distinguish 
between  the  faith  and  conviction  of  the  primitive  community  on  the 
one  hand,  and  Jesus'  own  opinion  on  the  other.  There  all  is  sketched 
from  the  standpoint  of  faith,  not  from  the  standpoint  of  critical  his- 
torical fidelity.  The  witness  concerning  Jesus  was  primarily  a  confes- 
sion of  faith  for  evangelizing  purposes,  rather  than  a  recording  of 
history  for  after  times.  The  primitive  Christians  did  not  suppose 
there  would  be  any  "  after  times."  As  a  result  it  is  so  hard  to  dis- 
tinguish the  original  words  of  Jesus  from  what  is  due  to  the  enthus- 


140      CHRISTIANITY  IX  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

iasm  of  faith,  that  we  must  say  with  Weinel  that  it  is  our  scientific 
duty  to  confess  that  we  cannot  answer  with  certainty  the  question  as 
to  whether  Jesus  did  or  did  not  hold  that  he  was  the  Messiah.  (How- 
ever, the  effort  to  become  certain  has  value,  even  if  it  lands  us  in 
uncertainty.) 

At  first  the  Messianic  hope  had  been  for  an  earthly  and  historical 
hero  of  God,  who  should  overthrow  the  world-powers,  and  reign  as 
king.  Later,  the  Messiah  was  thought  of  as  supernatural  and  the 
coming  of  the  kingdom  as  apocalyptic.  Then  it  was  asserted 
that  the  Messiah  could  come  only  if  the  people  were  pure,  and 
the  idea  appealed  to  John  the  Baptist,  and  apparently  to  Jesus  also. 
At  all  events,  there  were  various  modifications  of  the  Messianic  idea, 
and  the  question  is  whether  there  may  not  have  been  one  to  which 
Jesus  could  turn  as  an  appropriate  self-designation.  Or  may  he  not 
have  said  that  he  was  a  Messiah  in  a  new  sense?  Although  we  can 
not  become  certain,  the  preponderant  evidence  seems  to  be  in  favor  of 
the  proposition  that  he  did  say  he  was  the  Messiah.  To  be  sure,  it 
must  be  remembered  in  connection  with  the  recorded  self-witness  of 
Jesus  at  his  trial,  that  apparently  no  disciple  was  present.  And  yet 
the  explanation  of  the  trial  seems  to  be  that  Jesus  was  regarded  as  a 
false  Messiah.  And  so  the  bearer  of  the  higher  ideal  fell  a  victim  to 
the  vulgar  reality  about  him.  In  the  name  of  God  the  Son  of  God 
was  nailed  to  the  cross.  Jesus  was  evidently  not  the  Messiah  the 
people  wanted. 

But  why  did  Jesus  put  his  new  wine  into  the  old  bottles  of  Messianic 
expectation  ?  On  the  one  hand  it  must  be  remembered  that  although 
Jesus  is  the  home  of  the  eternal  and  the  real,  he  could  not  be  a  child  of 
man  without  being  a  child  of  his  time.  What  is  represented  as  his 
idea  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  coming  from  heaven  suddenly,  through 
God's  power,  is  not  in  all  respects  identical  with  the  modern  concep- 
tion, as  represented  by  Kant  and  Ritschl,  for  instance.  (Every  faith 
is  unique.  A  man  cannot  confess  another's  faith  sincerely.  Let  us 
confess  our  own  confession,  with  courage  like  that  which  Jesus 
showed.  Let  us  be  inwardly  like  him,  even  where  we  must  be  out- 
wardly unlike  him.)  But  on  the  other  hand,  in  adopting  the  Messi- 
anic concept,  Jesus  regenerated  and  humanized  it.  He  dignified  the 
Messianic  title;  it  was  not  the  taking  of  the  title  that  led  to  his  dig- 
nity. His  filial  consciousness  was  the  root  of  his  Messianic  conscious- 
ness, and  not  vice  versa..  It  is  Jesus  himself,  not  the  Messianic  idea, 
that  is  the  Gospel.  Our  thought  as  to  the  Messiahship  of  Jesus  does 
not  need  to  affect  our  certainty  as  to  his  disposition  and  love.  It  was 
not  the  Messianic  in  Jesus,  but  the  human  that  was  divine.  And, 
finding  the  divine  in  the  moral  and  human,  we  may  safely  keep  the 
human  Jesus,  even  if  we  must  let  the  Messianic  element  go. 

It  is  not  denied  that  the  Messianic  drama  has  been  a  most  potent 
factor  in  the  history  of  religion.  Its  picture  of  a  pre-existent  heav- 
enly Being,  becoming  incarnate,  dying,  rising  again,  being  exalted, 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS      141 

and  coming  again  to  judge  the  living  and  the  dead,  formed  the  ker- 
nel of  Paulinism,  and  was  made  the  fundament  of  western  ecclesias- 
tical orthodoxy.  It  has  been  the  channel  through  which  millions  of 
hearts  have  been  given  the  best  they  have.  And  yet,  whoever  cannot 
put  his  faith  in  it,  to  hinf  it  is  myth.  Henceforth  Paul  must  de- 
crease and  Jesus  increase.  At  last  the  age  of  Jesus  has  come.  (Is 
Arthur  Bonus  right  when  he  says  that  religion  cannot  get  on  without 
myth,  and  that  the  need  of  the  hour  is  a  new  one,  suited  to  our  mod- 
ern world-view?  After  all,  is  error  the  right  word  to  use  of  ideas  in 
which  one  necessarily  participates  because  he  is  a  child  of  his  time? 
There  is  hardly  an  idea  which  does  not  in  time  become  antiquated, 
but  must  we  call  our  thought  erroneous  on  that  account?  Ontologic- 
ally  Santa  Claus  is  unreal,  but  morally  Santa  Claus  is  as  real  as  any- 
thing in  the  world.)  Must  dogmatics  content  itself  with  a  faithful 
reproduction  of  the  Biblical  estimate  of  Jesus?  Is  the  theological 
theory  in  the  gospel  narratives  as  binding  as  the  moral  and  religious 
values  discoverable  there?  There  are  decisive  reasons  against  an 
affirmative  reply  to  these  questions.  The  intellectual  conceptions  of 
the  New  Testament  writers  were  necessarily  conditioned  by  the  stage 
of  culture  of  the  time.  Their  Christological  theory  was  determined 
by  their  world-view  in  general ;  they  embodied  their  judgments  in  con- 
cepts of  the  time.  And  if  that  antique  world-view  was  essentially 
transitory,  then  to  eternalize  the  old  Christological  theory  would  be  to 
confound  what  belongs  to  an  age  with  what  is  eternal.  Indeed  there  is 
a  danger  of  injuring  faith  when  what  is  of  theoretical  cognition  is  im- 
ported into  it.  There  are  times  when  we  can  only  keep  the  faith  by 
discarding  the  theory,  and  it  must  not  be  assumed  that  the  New  Tes- 
tament theory  is  necessarily  to  remain  eternally  in  theology.  Assum- 
ing the  new  view  of  the  world,  the  need  of  the  hour  is  for  the  recon- 
structing of  the  Christological  value-judgment  on  the  basis  of  this  new 
world-view,  and  this  in  such  a  way  that  it  will  serve  the  present  situa- 
tion as  the  Athanasian  Christology  served  in  its  day.  If  the  ancient 
Christians  had  a  right  to  Messianize  or  Logosize  the  figure  of  Jesus, 
why  have  we  not  the  right  to  do  a  similar  thing  to-day  ?  The  question 
is,  What  revaluation  of  Jesus  is  necessary  to  make  him  serviceable  in 
the  life  of  the  modern  man  ? 

§81.  The  Problem  in  Relation  to  the  Biblical  Witness  of  Faith 
in  Jesus  Christ. 

1.  Dogmatic  Christology  is  directly  related  to  another  group 
of  Biblical  material,  viz.  the  witness  of  faith  of  the  primitive 
community  concerning  Jesus,  and  this  witness  is  contained  in 
the  New  Testament.  Three  things  are  common  to  this  wit- 
ness: (a)  The  main  content  —  and  this  is  fixed  in  two  form- 
ulas, viz.  (1)  "Jesus  is  the  Christ,"  and  (2)  "the  Lord 


142     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Jesus  " ;  (b)  The  basis  of  the  Messianic  witness  of  these  first 
witnesses  rests  upon  (a)  their  certainty  of  the  resurrection 
of  Jesus  and  of  his  exaltation  to  heavenly  glory;  (£)  their 
present  experience  of  the  fruits  of  the  Spirit,  issuing  from 
him;  (y)  the  conviction  that  Old  Testament  predictions  were 
fulfilled  in  him;  and  (8)  the  knowledge  of  his  earthly  life 
and  work.1  (c)  The  character' of  this  Xew  Testament  witness 
to  Christ  is  («)  not  dogmatic  doctrine,  but  enthusiastic  dis- 
course, (ft)  Therefore  this  witness  is  given  in  a  figurative 
and  picturesque  expression  rather  than  in  theoretical  and  philo- 
sophical conceptions  and  formulae.  In  particular  (y)  Old 
Testament  designations  and  types  came  to  play  a  leading  role, 
e.  g.  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  (8)  There  are  only  ap- 
proaches toward  a  real  theological  process  of  proof  and  con- 
ceptual formation.2 

Notes  to  §81 : 1 

1.  Which  has  been  more  dynamic  in  the  history  of  the  church,  the 
life  of  Jesus  or  the  Messianic  idea?     Undoubtedly,  the  latter.     We 
have  had  seventeen  hundred  years  of  Christianity  without  accurate 
knowledge  of  the  historic  Jesus.     Is  such  knowledge  necessary  to-day  ? 

Orthodoxy  asks  us  to  identify  indissolubly  the  (largely  mytholog- 
ical) Messianic  idea  with  the  essence  of  the  Christian  religion,  and  to 
keep  both  or  give  up  both.  But  since  the  modern  critical  mind  can- 
not make  sure  of  that  idea,  it  seeks  to  disengage  the  kernel  from  the 
shell,  and  to  substitute  the  modern  ideas  of  immanence  and  evolution 
for  Messianism. 

God  is  naturally  the  object  of  religious  faith.  But  Jesus  has  be- 
come the  object  of  religious  faith  also.  This  is  the  distinguishing 
mark  of  the  Christian  religion.  How  Jesus  came  to  be  the  object  of 
religious  faith  is  a  question  of  genetic-historical  science.  Whether  he 
ought  still  to  be  an  object  of  religious  faith,  and  if  so,  in  what  sense  — 
these  are  questions  for  the  Christological  part  of  dogmatics.  But  in 
answering  these  questions,  we  must  seek  to  employ  the  results  of  the 
genetic-historical  study.  Who  Jesus  was,  and  what  he  thought  of 
himself,  are  the  two  most  important  historical  questions  for  dogmatic 
theology. 

2.  "  The  Door,"  « the  Vine,"  "  the  Shepherd,"  "  the  Physician," 
"the   Corner-Stone,   "the   Foundation,"   "the   First   Fruits,"    "the 
Morning  Star,"  "  the  Bread  of  Life,"  "  the  Water  of  Life  "—  these  are 
some  of  the  pictures  and  symbols  whicli  faith  uses  in  seeking  to  set 
forth  its  reality.     A  later  theology  has  erected  some  of  these  symbols 
into  theoretical  formulae,  e.  g.  "  the  Ransom." 

Even  Paul  was  not  primarily  concerned,  even  in  the  Epistle  to  the 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     143 

Romans,  with  giving  an  organized  system  of  theology.  His  aim  was 
practical,  missionary,  evangelizing  and  edifying.  Primitive  Christi- 
anity is  almost  pre-theological. 

2.  Precisely  this  character  of  the  common  witness  of  faith 
in  Jesus  Christ  leaves  room  for  diverse  individual  formations 
of  thought  concerning  Jesus.     Thus   in  connection  with  the 
diverse  apprehension  of  the  redemption  wrought  by  Jesus  Christ, 
along  with  the  Messianic  witness  of  the  primitive  community, 
there  is  the  special  witness  of  Paul,  of  the  Epistle  to  the  He- 
brews and  of  the  Johannine  writings. 

3.  Dogmatic  Christology  may  not  be  content  simply  to  give 
an  arrangement  as  unitary  as  possible  of  this  New  Testament 
witness  concerning  Jesus  Christ.     Its  task  is  independently  to 
establish  and  systematically  to  develop  what  can  and  ought  to 
be  certain  to  us  through  personal  trust  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  to 
do  this  in  the  conceptual  forms  most  intelligible  to  the  pres- 
ent.1 

Note  to  §81 :  3 

1.  What  Jesus  was  and  what  Jesus  willed;  how  Jesus  viewed  God, 
the  world  and  man ;  how  he  answered  the  questions,  What  is  the  main 
thing  in  the  mind  of  God?  What  is  religion?  —  all  this  is  clear. 
What  does  Jesus  hope,  believe,  love  ?  What  did  the  name  of  God  sig- 
nify to  him?  What  was  his  standard  of  the  worth  of  man  ?  Here  we 
can  be  sure,  and  the  answers  come  from  the  depth  of  the  heart,  not 
from  the  logic  of  the  understanding.  In  the  words  of  Jesus  the  main 
thing  was  confidence  in  God,  purity  of  heart,  mercifulness,  humility, 
placability,  yearning. 

It  was  faith  in  Jesus  which  founded  the  Church.  But  what  was  sec- 
ondary for  the  primitive  church  is  primary  for  us.  Jesus  helps  us  to 
understand  the  world,  ourselves  and  God.  But  when  men  gave  to  him 
the  adhesion  of  their  wills  and  of  feeling,  their  intellects  were  stirred. 
Who  was  Jesus  ?  they  asked,  and  in  answer  to  this  question  the  creeds 
were  formulated. 

/8.  The  Direction  of  the  Principal  Attempts  at  the  Solution  of 
the  Christological  Problem. 

§82.  The  Ecclesiastical  Two-Nature  Doctrine  and  its  Persist- 
ence into  the  Present. 

1.  One  attempt  to  win  a  unitary  conceptual  construction  of 
Christology  on  the  basis  of  the  Biblical  material  is  to  be  found 


144      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  the  orthodox  ecclesiastical  Christology.  Christology  was  di- 
vided into  three  parts:  (1)  the  doctrine  of  the  nature  of  Christ; 
(2)  the  doctrine  of  the  work  of  Christ;  (3)  the  doctrine  of 
the  offices  of  Christ.  Xow  as  to  (1),  the  doctrine  of  the  per- 
sona, Christi  developed  one  proposition  only,  viz.  very  God  and 
very  man  in  one  inseparable  person.  That  one  proposition 
treats,  therefore,  (a)  de  duabus  in  Christo  naturisj  (b)  de  una 
Christi  persona.  In  treating  the  one  person  of  Christ  the  fol- 
lowing was  developed:  Unitio  et  unio  personalis;  communio 
naiurarum;  communicatio  idiomatum.1  Now  as  to  (3),  the 
doctrine  of  the  states  of  Christ  (de  statibus  Christi'))  the  at- 
tempt is  made  to  harmonize,  dogmatic  Christology  with  the 
evangelical  picture  of  the  life  of  Jesus  by  means  of  the  follow- 
ing distinctions:  (a)  status  exinanitionis  («wxris)  ;  (b)  status 
exaltaiionis 


Notes  to  §82  :  1 

1.  According  to  the  doctrine  of  communicatio  idiomatum,  the  pe- 
culiarity of  the  divine  nature  was  communicated  to  the  human,  so  that 
the  human  became  omnipotent,  omniscient,  etc.,  and  the  peculiarity  of 
the  human  was  communicated  to  the  divine,  so  that  the  divine  could 
suffer,  and  atone  for  human  sin.     The  orthodox  theologians,  required 
by  their  doctrine  of  Scripture  to  find  this  doctrine  of  communicatio 
idiomatum  in  the  Scriptures,  turn  the  saying,  "  Why  callest  thou  me 
good?     There  is  none  good  but  one,  that  is,  G*od,"  into  an  argument 
for  the  full  deity  of  the  human,  historical  Jesus. 

2.  According  to  orthodoxy,  the  Son  of  God  laid  aside  his  divine 
glory  and  then  took  it  up  again;  he  alienated  from  himself  certain  di- 
vine qualities,  and  then  integrated  them  again.     What  is  meant  is  at 
bottom  good,  viz.  that  the  great  and  merciful  God  serves  us,  and  is  not 
too  good  for  our  daily  human  food.     Perhaps  the  form  of  the  orthodox 
doctrine  was  necessary  when  the  doctrine  was  excogitated,  but  that 
terrible  being,  the  modern  man,  cannot  do  anything  with  it! 

2.  Ecclesiastical  Christology  has  sought  to  preserve  in  its 
logical  schematism  the  two  essential  convictions  of  faith:  (a) 
that  the  character  and  work  of  God  himself  are  known  through 
Jesus  ;  *  (b)  that  through  the  worth  of  his  sufferings  and  death, 
Jesus  is  able  to  reconcile  man  to  God.  Ecclesiastical  Christol- 
ogy is  the  result  of  long  work  of  the  Church  on  the  problem, 
How  to  make  intelligible  the  divine  efficiency  of  the  man, 
Jesus,  and  to  assure  the  right  of  faith  in  him.  This  question 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     145 

is  under  discussion  anew  to-day,  and  two  queries  are  raised, 
(a)  What  is  the  relation  of  the  sufferings  of  Jesus  to  his  whole 
life,  and  what  is  there  in  his  sufferings  that  can  effect  the 
reconciliation  of  others  to  God?  The  other  query  is,  (ft)  In 
what  sense,  if  at  all,  is  Jesus  an  object  to  which  Christian  faith 
is  directed  ? 

Note  to  §82 :  2 

1.  God  is  as  good  as  Jesus  is.  This  is  the  affirmation  of  Christian 
faith.  But  for  the  modern  man  with  his  monism,  the  question  of 
apologetics  is  this :  Is  not  God  a  terrible  God,  the  God  of  the  struggle 
for  existence  ?  Is  he  not  more  like  Nero,  or  Herod,  or  Caiaphas,  than 
like  Jesus  ?  What  right  have  we  to  take  Jesus  as  the  analogy  ?  Does 
not  Herod  belong  to  God  as  truly  as  Jesus  ? 

You  cannot  have  the  object  of  religious  faith  and  the  object  of 
prayer  different.  I  pray  to  such  a  God  as  Jesus  could  be  prophet  and 
revealer  of.  The  inscrutable  God  we  do  not  know  or  love  or  trust. 
The  God  for  us  is  the  one  that  can  be  known  from  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

Is  it  fair  to  judge  a  musician  by  his  best  music,  or  by  his  worst? 
A  personality  by  his  best  work,  or  by  failures?  Is  it  fair  to  judge 
the  race  by  its  best  civilization,  or  by  its  worst  ?  In  the  long  stretch 
of  time  and  space,  is  the  trend  upward,  or  otherwise? 

We  may  judge  reality  by  the  best  output  of  its  expression.  If  Jesus 
is  an  alien  importation  into  the  race,  then  we  cannot  take  Jesus  as  a 
piece  of  the  whole,  and  judge  by  him.  But  if  Jesus  came  up  within 
the  race,  we  can.  Religion  lives  and  thrives  on  the  paradoxical  situa- 
tion which  requires  faith  to  be  a  venturing,  a  daring.  It  lives  upon 
the  tension  and  stress  of  human  experience. 

3.  But  with  respect  to  the  attempts  of  ecclesiastical  Christol- 
ogy,  criticism  of  the  doctrinal  form  is  required,  (a)  The 
criticism  from  the  standpoint  of  the  history  of  dogma.  This 
treatment  shows  three  things:  (a)  that  the  peculiar  appre- 
hension of  salvation  as  a  deification  of  human  nature  in  the 
old  Greek  Church  was  regulative  in  the  formation  of  the  two- 
nature  doctrine;  (£)  that  the  Western  or  Latin  Church  com- 
bined with  this  doctrine  thus  formed  another  interest,  espe- 
cially since  Augustine  —  the  interest,  namely,  in  making  intel- 
ligible the  worth  of  the  work  of  Christ  upon  God  (according 
to  the  Greek  Church  the  work  of  Christ  was  upon  man;  ac- 
cording to  the  Latin  Church  the  work  of  Christ  was  upon 
God)  ;  1  (y)  that  the  Reformation  preserved  the  traditional 


146     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

formula,  but  reinterpreted  it  in  many  ways  in  the  sense  of  the 
new  understanding  of  salvation.2  (b)  This  leads  to  the  sys- 
tematic criticism :  (a)  that  the  form  of  doctrine  does  not  agree 
with  the  new  Eeformation  conception  of  salvation;  (/8)  that 
it  does  not  attain  to  a  view  of  the  person  of  Jesus  that  is  true 
to  life  and  to  history ;  8  (y)  that  it  transcends  the  limits  of  the 
evangelical  conception  of  faith.4  With  this  systematic  criti- 
cism is  interwoven  (c)  the  Biblical-theological  criticism,  which 
shows  (a)  that  the  ecclesiastical-doctrinal  form  does  violence  to 
the  Biblical  portrait  of  the  character  of  Jesus  and  to  his  self- 
witness;  (/?)  that  it  lags  behind  and  falls  below  the  living 
wealth  of  the  Biblical  witness  of  faith  on  the  part  of  the  primi- 
tive community. 

Notes  to. §82:  3 

1.  For  the  old  Greek  church,  the  difficulty  was  primarily,  mortality, 
frailty,  finitude,  out  of  which  man  was  to  be  saved  into  the  infinite  and 
immortal  life  of  God.     For  the  Latin  Church,  the  difficulty  was  moral 
obliquity  rather  than  psychological  finitude.     The  work  of  Christ  was 
to  remove  an  obstacle  in  God,  that  God  might  be  able  to  operate  re- 
demptively  on  man.     But  as  against  this,  we  must  set  the  true  Chris- 
tian view,  that  Jesus  did  not  die  to  make  it  possible  for  God  to  love 
man,  but  because  God  did  love  man. 

2.  The  Reformers  kept  the  two-nature  doctrine,  but  continued  that 
process  of  its  moralization  which  had  begun  in  the  Latin  Church. 
There  has  been  a  progressive  ethicization  of  the  Christological  doc- 
trine, and  gradually  the  atonement-doctrine  has  been  ethicized  as  well. 
The  ontological  alienation  of  man  from  God  stressed  by  the  Greek 
Church,  gave  way  to  the  thought  of  a  moral  estrangement,  the  over- 
coming of  which  has  come  to  be  thought  of  as  having  God  as  its 
agent. 

It  would  be  strange,  indeed,  if  God  should  require  us  to  love  our 
enemies,  while  he  himself  did  not  love  his  own  enemies.  The  Latin 
doctrine  was  still  sub-Christian  and  sub-moral,  pre-Christian  and  pre- 
moral.  It  belongs  to  the  very  nature  of  love  to  be  free,  spontaneous, 
autonomous,  and  even  to  love  one's  enemies. 

3.  See  an  article  by  G.  B.  Foster,  entitled  "  Jesus'  Doctrine  of  God," 
Biblical  World,  May,  1898. 

The  ecclesiastical  Christ  was  not  a  human  being,  not  even  man  in 
general.  The  human  all  through  suffered  abridgment  and  elimina- 
tion, except  in  formal  and  nominal  matters. 

4.  The  faith  which  saves  is  trust  in  the  God  of  whom  Jesus  was 
prophet  and  revealer. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     147 

4.  It  is  for  these  reasons  that  ecclesiastical  Christology, 
though  retained  still  in  the  Church,  is  yet  retained  in  an  at- 
tenuated form.1  Effort  has  been  made  to  do  justice  to  the 
truth  of  the  human  nature  and  development  of  Jesus.  This 
has  led  in  the  case  of  those  theologians  who  defend  the  basis 
of  the  two-nature  doctrine  to  manifold  deductions  from  that 
doctrine ;  and  those  ecclesiastical  theologians  who  maintain  the 
kenosis  of  the  divine  Logos  set  themselves  in  contradiction  to 
the  fundamental  thoughts  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine,  and 
the  religious  content  of  ecclesiastical  Christology  is  at  bottom 
injured  by  these  modernizations,  and  the  unitariness  of  the 
doctrine  is  thereby  destroyed.2 

Notes  to  §82 :  4 

1.  The  "orthodox"  have  departed  from  orthodoxy  in  a  surprising 
degree.     Only  when  liberalism  is  consciously  held  under  the  mask  of 
orthodoxy  is  it  immoral. 

2.  Topics  for  investigation :    (1)  Given  Jesus  of  Nazareth  as  a  real 
human  being,  what  are  tbe  stages  and  conditions  of  the  process  in  and 
through  which  the  human  was  eliminated  and  he  metamorphosed  into 
an  ontological  entity  in  the  third  and  fourth  centuries?     (2)  What 
are  the  stages  and  conditions  of  that  process  through  which  transition 
has  been  made  progressively  from  the  Christological  entity  to  the  real 
Jesus  whom  Biblical  science  wishes  to  see? 

§83.  The  Rationalistic  Christology  and  Its  Persistence  into  the 

Present. 

1.  A  rationalistic  criticism,  especially  in  Socinianism,  was 
executed  upon  ecclesiastical  doctrine.  This  criticism  sought 
to  cut  the  knot  of  the  problem  which  busied  the  Church  in  its 
religious  significance,  as  follows:  it  treated  the  person  of  Jesus 
not  as  real  and  original  object  of  faith,  but  attributed  to  him 
a  religious  importance  only  indirectly.  But  this  rationalism 
grew  up  prior  to  the  new  philosophical  development  and  world- 
view,  and  it  fell  into  self-contradiction.1 

Note  to  §83 : 1 

1.  What  is  the  function  in  Christology  of  the  original  character- 
sketch  of  Jesus,  of  the  self-witness  of  Jesus,  and  of  the  primitive 
Christian  ifitn<>ss? 

When  the  Christian  religion  was  disengaged  from  its  material  Jew- 


148     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ish  soil  and  struck  root  in  the  Graco-Roman  soil,  speculative  philos- 
ophers, some  of  them  agnostic,  turned  eagerly  to  this  new  religion. 
This  ended  in  the  Christian  religion  being  moulded  in  the  Greek  phil- 
osophical categories.  Then,  on  this  Gneco-Christian  foundation,  the 
ecclesiastical  dogmas  were  formulated.  What  interest  had  the  ecclesi- 
astical theologians  in  the  historic  Jesus? 

There  are  three  different  ways  of  considering  Jesus,  viz.  historico- 
critically,  ethically,  and  religiously.  The  ecclesiastical  dogmatics  was 
concerned  solely  with  the  religious  question  (What  is  Jesus  worth  for 
us  and  what  conclusions  can  be  drawn  therefrom  as  to  his  relation  to 
God  and  to  us?),  and  the  answers  were  given  solely  by  philosophical 
speculation,  with  the  use  of  the  Greek  philosophical  categories. 
There  was  little  concern  as  to  the  empirical,  concrete  man  of  Galilee. 
To-day  we  have  returned  to  the  historico-critical  question ;  we  are  in- 
terested in  rediscovering  the  man  of  Galilee.  What  shall  we  do  next? 
Shall  we  proceed  to  an  ethical  evaluation,  and  thence  to  the  religious 
consideration?  Shall  we  be  able  to  set  forth  the  religious  value  of  the 
man  of  Galilee  in  symbols  as  satisfactory  to  the  theoretical  conscious- 
ness of  to-day  as  the  older  Christology  was  in  its  day  ? 

Will  Jesus  continue  to  be  a  necessary  function  in  religion,  or  will 
he  be  accidental  and  incidental?  Shall  we  use  his  gifts  and  forget  the 
giver,  as  we  use  knives  and  forks,  or  the  institution  of  family  life,  and 
forget  their  inventors?  Shall  we  have  an  attitude  to  God  which  was 
originated  by  Jesus,  and  yet  Jesus  cease  to  function  necessarily  in  our 
relation  with  God?  What  is  modern  Christianity  going  to  do  with 
the  historic  Jesus,  when  it  rediscovers  him? 

We  cannot,  as  religious  thinkers,  waste  all  our  time  in  purely  his- 
torical questions.  Either  the  Jesus  of  history  will  again  be  accorded  a 
religious  value,  or  he  will  be  relegated  to  the  historical  realm  and  the 
soul  will  go  directly  to  God  on  the  basis  of  its  own  intuitions  and 
needs,  and  hopes  and  fears. 

2.  For  rationalistic  theology  the  object  of  faith  was  at  bot- 
tom the  religion  of  reason  preached  by  Jesus  —  a  religion  whose 
absolute  truth  was  self-evidencing.  Thus  Jesus  was  only  the 
"  introductor "  ( Socinus^  of  this  truth.  So  far  lie  was  in- 
deed prophet  of  God  and  hero  of  humanity.  Jesus  is  to-day 
still  important  as  teacher  and  model,  but  a  faith  in  Christ 
does  not  belong  to  the  content  of  Christianity.1 

Note  to  §83 :  2 

1.  Much  should  be  made  of  the  point  of  the  imitability  of  Jesus. 
The  imitability  of  the  atonement  rightly  takes  the  place  of  its  unique 
grandeur.  But  the  copy-theory  of  morality,  like  the  copy-theory  of 
knowledge,  must  be  discarded  in  favor  of  the  view  which  regards  the 
mind  as  creative  both  in  knowing  and  iu  willing. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     149 

3.  But  for  Kant  also  and  for  the  speculative  German  phi- 
losophy it  was  the  moral  or  the  metaphysical  as  against  cither 
the  merely  ecclesiastical  or  the  merely  historical  that  was  the 
sole  saving  power.     But  the  rationalistic  thoughts  were  deep- 
ened in  the  case  of  Kant,  through  the  distinction  between  the 
soul-saving  Christ-ideal  and  the  historical  Jesus,  and   in  the 
case  of  the  speculative  philosophy  through  the  distinction  be- 
tween the  idea  of  divine  humanity  and  the  single  person  in 
whom  that  idea  had  actualized  itself  most  perfectly.1 

Note  to  §83 :  3 

1.  By  Kant  and  the  rationalists  the  transition  was  made  from  the 
Christological  substance,  the  ecclesiastical  entity  of  two  natures  in 
one  person,  the  second  of  the  three  eternal  persons,  to  an  ideal  Christ. 
Here  it  is  not  the  empirical  but  the  ideal  Christ  that  saves.  Is  the 
ideal  Christ  the  real  Jesus  of  history?  Kant  would  not  have  affirmed 
it.  Intimations  have  come  from  the  Jesus  of  history,  but  the  ideal 
Christ  is  a  construction  of  the  religious  consciousness  itself. 

In  the  speculative  philosophy  the  idea  of  the  divine  humanity  takes 
the  place  of  the  ideal  Christ  of  Kant.  That  idea  is  regarded  as  having 
had  its  best  actualization  in  Jesus.  But,  as  Strauss  put  it,  it  is  not 
the  nature  of  the  Absolute  Idea  to  pour  all  of  its  fulness  into  a  single 
historic  exemplar.  The  idea  is  embodied,  rather,  in  the  whole  of  .hu- 
manity. Where  the  Church  said  God  is  in  one  historic  person,  mod- 
ern liberalism  says  God  is  in  all. 

4.  In  modern  liberal  theology  the  Christian  principle  as  a 
rule  takes  the  place  of  the  Christ-idea.     By  Christian  prin- 
ciple is  meant  the  new  spiritual  and  living  power  which  en- 
tered humanity  with  Christianity.     To  the  consistent  advocates 
of  this  position  the  lofty  declarations  of  the  church-doctrine 
are  valid  originally  and  peculiarly  only  for  this  Christian  prin- 
ciple, and  not  for  the  person  of  Christ.     The  person  of  Christ 
is  only  the  vehicle,  historically  original  and  most  important 
still,  of  the  operation  of  that  Christian  principle.1 

Note  to  §83: 4 

1.  What  shall  we  think  of  and  do  with  Jesus,  when  religion  is 
viewed  from  the  functional  standpoint? 

Religion  is  not  a  dogma,  nor  a  cult,  nor  an  institution.  It  is  a 
necessary  and  universal  function  of  the  life  of  the  human  spirit.  Just 
what  is  that  function.  According  to  the  functional  psychologists, 
consciousness  is  a  device  by  means  of  which  the  reactions  of  the  or- 
ganism to  its  environment  are  facilitated.  Similarly,  religion  may  be 


150      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

described  as  a  device  by  means  of  which  the  power  of  an  organism  in 
reaction  with  its  environment  is  made  equal  to  its  needs  and  purpose 
by  means  of  an  alliance  of  the  organism  with  higher  powers.  It  is  the 
human  effort,  in  the  presence  of  what  looks  like  the  uncontrollable  fate 
of  the  world  in  wkich  we  live,  to  make  our  power  equal  to  our  pur- 
pose and  our  needs,  as  we  strive  onward  toward  our  self-effectua- 
tion. A  reality  is  sought,  in  alliance  with  which  we  can  accomplish 
this  self-effectuation. 

Now  is  Jesus  (1)  a  means  by  which  we  may  have  best  insight  into 
that  "higher  power,"  or  is  he  (2)  that  higher  power  himself,  or  is  he 
(3)  simply  a  typical  illustration  —  albeit  our  best  illustration  —  of 
the  religious  function?  If  the  Christological  dogma  does  not  func- 
tion now  as  it  once  did,  will  the  historic  Jesus  function,  or  shall  I  my- 
self perform  the  function,  Jesus  being  mere  example,  Pathfinder,  in 
the  effort  of  the  human  spirit  to  relate  itself  to  the  divine  so  that  the 
human  life  shall  attain  the  end  of  its  being? 

As  the  man  of  science  seeks  to  pass  from  popular  opinion  to  scien- 
tific conviction,  so  we  must  seek  to  pass  out  of  the  upheaving,  tumul- 
tuous background  of  human  wonder  and  query  and  anxiety  and  unset- 
tlement  into  something  more  certain  and  thorough  in  our  thought  as 
to  the  function  of  Jesus  in  the  life  of  religion. 

5.  How  is  this  opposition  between  principle  and  person  to 
be  evaluated?  In  abstract  scientific  work  there  is  no  objection 
to  our  distinguishing  the  gospel  brought  by  Jesus  Christ,  or 
the  spiritual  life  and  blessedness  proceeding  from  that  life, 
from  the  historical  person,  Jesus.  And  further,  there  is  no 
objection  to  our  raising  the  question  as  to  the  relation  between 
principle  and  person.  But  the  answer  to  our  question  consist- 
ent with  historical  Christianity  must  run  as  follows:  It  is 
only  in  Jesus'  person  itself  that  that  spiritual  life  and  re- 
demptive good  is  ideally  real  and  operative  in  creative  power, 
and  so  the  primary  object  of  faith  must  still  remain  the  per- 
son of  Jesus.  But  the  person  of  Jesus  only  because  in  and 
through  him  we  have  the  fullest  expression  which  we  know 
of  the  character  and  purpose  of  God,  so  that  in  the  last  analysis 
one  passes  through  Jesus  to  God  as  the  sole  object  and  portion 
of  the  Christian  religious  faith.  It  is  precisely  here  that  the 
strength  of  Christianity  lies,  for  the  ultimate  as  well  as  the 
richest  reality  of  which  we  know  is  after  all  personal.  We 
see  in  this  conception,  therefore,  the  right  of  the  content  of 
ecclesiastical  Christology,  over  against  the  rationalistic  Christol- 
ogy,  much  as  it  is  true  that  the  form  of  the  ecclesiastical 


SUPERSTRUCTUBE  OF  CHEISTIAN  DOGMATICS     151 

Christology  is  untenable  to  the  bearers  of  the  modern  view  of 
the  world.1 

Note  to  §83 :  5 

1.  It  may  very  well  turn  out  that  the  enrichment  of  the  concept 
"principle"  that  shall  be  adequate  to  make  it  an  explanation  of  em- 
pirical personal  reality  may,  so  to  speak,  issue  in  the  personalizing  of 
the  principle,  and  that  the  making  of  the  person  the  home  of  perma- 
nent and  eternal  values,  by  virtue  of  which  the  personal  comes  to  be 
indeed  ideally  personal,  may  issue  in  the  widening  of  the  personal  into 
something  of  the  character  of  the  principle  as  well.  Thus  the  old 
antinomy  of  principle  and  person  may  be  seen  to  be  capable  of  being 
transcended.  This  is  the  problem  of  thought.  It  is  a  part  of  that 
larger  problem  of  the  relation  between  the  eternal  and  the  historical 
in  general,  a  larger  problem  in  which  the  eternal  is  not  historyless  and 
history  is  not  empty.  Here  it  will  be  seen  that  eternity  is  but  the  per- 
sistence of  our  values  in  the  midst  of  the  process  and  mutation  of  the 
historical. 

§84.  The  Schleiermacher-Christology  and  Us  Further  Develop- 
ment in  the  Present. 

1.  In  the  midst  of  rationalism  Schleiermacher  had  a  pro- 
founder  insight  into  the  self-dependent  essence  of  piety,  into 
the  historical  basis  of  religion  and  especially  of  Christianity, 
and  into  the  importance  of  fellowship  in  the  Christian  life, 
and  hence  the  importance  of  the  Christian  Church  for  the 
Christian  life.1  (a)  According  to  Schleiermacher  the  center 
of  Christian  piety  (FrommiqTceit}  is  the  consciousness  of  the 
redeeming  power  of  Jesus  Christ,  whose  portrait  (Bild)  the 
Christian  community  mediates  to  us.  (b)  His  view  of  this 
matter  conditioned  his  conception  of  the  task  and  method  of 
dogmatic  Christology.  Dogmatic  theology,  he  thought,  has 
to  develop  the  declarations  of  the  Christian  consciousness  con- 
cerning the  dignity  and  efficiency  of  Christ  in  their  reciprocal 
intimate  inter-connection. 

Note  to  §84 : 1 

1.  Schleiermacher  did  for  religion  what  Kant  did  for  knowledge. 
By  an  analysis  of  knowledge  Kant  found  the  immutable  forms  of 
knowledge.  Analogously  Schleiermacher  distinguished  between  the 
formal  and  immutable  factors  of  religion  and  its  material  and  mutable 
content.  The  immutable  form  of  religion  he  found  to  be  the  feeling 
of  absolute  dependence,  or  consciousness  of  the  presence  of  the  finite 


152      CHRISTIANITY  IX  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  the  infinite,  of  the  relative  in  the  absolute,  of  the  temporal  in  the 
eternal. 

2.  In  prosecuting  this  task  (a)  he  sought  to  characterize  the 
dignity  of  Christ  as  perfect  unity  of  a  single  personality  on 
the  one  hand  and  ideality  (Urbildlichkeit)  on  the  other,  and  to 
find  therein  the  real  being  of  God  in  Christ.1  (b)  He  de- 
fined the  efficiency  of  Christ  as  redeeming  and  reconciling  as 
to  its  content,  and  as  mystical  as  to  its  form,  or  character,  (c) 
Combining  these  two,  dignity  and  efficiency,  he  presented  the 
whole  phenomenon  of  Christ  as  the  finished  creation  of  hu- 
man nature. 

Note  to  §84: 2 

1.  See  §103  of  Schleiermacher's  GlaubensMire  (the  masterpiece  of 
Protestant  theology).  Schleiermacher's  Cliristological  problem  was 
this:  Given  Jesus,  the  man,  with  his  real  and  full  human  nature, 
what  must  he  have  been  to  have  produced  the  Christian  consciousness? 
How  much  of  what  ecclesiastical  Christology  affirmed  may  we  keep, 
consistently  with  the  real  and  full  humanity  of  Jesus?  What 
Schleiermacher  retained  was  simply  what  he  subsumed  under  his 
category  of  Urbildlichkeit:  Jesus  as  the  archetype  of  human  life.  Of 
the  deity  of  Christ,  that  only  is  retained  which  is  necessary  to  account 
for  the  content  of  the  Christian  consciousness. 

This  procedure  of  Schleiermacher  in  Christology  is  similar  to  that 
of  William  James  with  respect  to  the  metaphysical  attributes  of  God. 
He  asks  what  difference  they  make,  what  function  they  perform  in 
the  process  of  reality.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  claims,  we  only  need  a 
God  great  enough  to  account  for  what  is.  He  would  have  us  observe 
the  law  of  parsimony  in  theology.  Similarly,  in  answer  to  the  ques- 
tion, what  must  be  that  the  Christian  experience  may  be,  Schleier- 
macher sets  forth  as  the  minimum  the  full  human  personality  of 
Jesus  as  the  archetype  of  human  life. 

3.  Each  of  the  points  specified  in  1  and  2  above  contains 
correct  intimations  for  dogmatic  Christology.  Each,  however, 
gives  occasion  at  the  same  time  for  critical  hesitation  and  re- 
flection. In  1  (a)  where  the  center  of  Christian  piety  is  stated, 
we  miss  the  sharp  conception  of  the  redemptive  good  in  its 
ethical  content.1  In  1  (b)  a  decisive  return  to  the  Biblical 
picture  of  Jesus  is  wanting.  (For  Schleiermacher  Jesus  is 
Man  in  general,  but  Man  in  general  is  no  man  at  all.)  2  Ac- 
cordinglv  2  (a)  and  2  (b)  above  glide  over  into  an  aesthetic 
construction  of  the  person  and  efficiency  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS      153 

in  2   (c)  clear  teleological  comprehension  of  the  idea  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  is  wanting.8 

Notes  to  §84 :  3 

1.  Schleiermacher  came  out  of  the  romantic  movement  and  out  of 
the  Moravian,  mystical  type  of  piety.     These  account  for  the  abridg- 
ment of  the  ethical  thought  in  the  idea  of  redemption. 

2.  The  Christ  of  ecclesiastical  dogma  was  not  so  much  a  human 
being  as  an  ontological  substance.     In  Schleiermacher,  Jesus  is  real 
and  full  human  nature,  but  so  abstract  and  universal  as  to  seem  a  sur- 
vival of  the  Idea  of  speculative  philosophy. 

3.  Schleiermacher's  general  philosophical  position  is  that  of  Spin- 
oza, and  like  Spinoza  he  emphasizes  causality  to  the  exclusion  of  tele- 
ology.    So  here,  dignity  is  determined  by  referring  to  Source,  rather 
than  to  End  (viz.  the  kingdom  of  God). 

4.  We  may  detect  the  incentives  and  influence  of  Schleier- 
macher  in  Christology  in  widely  deviating  tendencies.     But 
these  incentives  have  been  most  fruitful  in  the  rise  of  a  series 
of  new  theologians  of  diverse  groups,  who  recognize  the  pres- 
ent, living,  divine  essence  and  redeeming  spiritual  work  in  the 
human  phenomenon  of  Jesus  himself.1     But  these  theologians 
seek  to  transcend  Schleiermacher  (a)   through  clearer  insight 
into  the  ethical  character  of  the  Christian  redemption,    (b) 
through  a  firmer  grounding  upon  the  Biblical  character-sketch 
and  self-witness  of  Jesus,  and  (c)  through  a  more  faithful  em- 
ployment of  the  New  Testament  witness  of  faith.     (In  these 
three  particulars  has  Schleiermacher  been  transcended  by  mod- 
ern theologians.) 

Note  to  §84 : 4 

1.  Seeing  the  divine  and  the  redemptive  in  the  human  Jesus  him- 
self —  this  is  what  is  common  in  all  modern  liberal  movements  in 
Christology.  Our  modern  world-view  makes  this  possible,  whereas 
the  old  world-view  made  it  impossible. 

y.  The  Way  to  the  Solution  of  the  Problem. 

§85.  Historical,  Ethical  and  Religious  Evaluation  of  the  Per- 
son and  Work  of  Jesus. 

1.  Employing  the  negative  and  positive  guidance  given  in 
the  history  of  Christoloiry,  we  have  to  develop  the  propositions 
of  Christian  faith  concerning  Jesus  Christ  in  an  orderly  sue- 


154      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

cession.  The  Church's  faith  in  Christ  is  faith  in  the  exalted, 
living  and  present  Lord.1  \Ve  have  to  take  our  starting  point 
in  dogmatics  in  Jesus'  earthly  being  and  work,  as  this  is  pre- 
sented to  us  in  the  character-sketch  and  self-witness  of  Jesus 
in  the  gospels,  and  mirrored  to  us  in  the  witness  of  faith  and 
the  life  of  the  Spirit  in  Christianity. 

Note  to  §85 : 1 

1.  Do  we  know  anything  of  an  extra-historical  existence  and  ac- 
tivity of  Jesus?  Might  his  existence  be  historical  instead  of  extra- 
historical,  and  yet  be  exalted?  For  exaltedness  does  not  consist  in 
the  matter  of  locality.  It  is  moral,  rather  than  physical  or  ontolog- 
ical.  Might  Jesus  be  regnant  forever  on  tbe  throne  of  history,  and 
yet  be  historical  and  not  extra-historical  in  his  life  and  operation? 
Is  not  the  historicalness  a  condition  of  his  exaltedness,  rather  than  a 
menace  to  it?  The  old  idea  is  a  survival  of  Messianism,  with  its  pre- 
existent  and  post-existent  heavenly  Being,  even  in  his  absence  making 
encroachments  on  the  world  and  dwelling  in  bis  people.  May  we  sur- 
render the  drama  of  the  pre-existent  and  post-existent  Being,  and  hold 
to  the  historical  presence  of  Jesus,  in  some  such  intelligible  way  as  we 
think  of  Beethoven  and  of  Kant  as  still  at  work  in  tbe  life  of  human- 
ity, or  as  "  John  Brown's  body  lies  a-moulding  in  the  grave,  but  his 
soul  goes  marching  on"?  Will  that  satisfy  the, religious  needs  of  the 
people?  (Will  you  preach  it,  and  will  the  people  come  to  hear  it?) 

The  Christian  says,  in  his  moments  of  meditation,  that  he  is  con- 
scious of  the  presence  of  Christ.  What  he  knows  indubitably  is  a  cer- 
tain kind  of  consciousness  in  its  subjective  aspect.  But  what  is  the 
objective  correlate  to  that  kind  of  experience  ?  Is  it  Jesus  ?  Or  is  it 
the  Spirit  of  that  God  whom  the  Christian  knows,  the  Spirit  of  the 
God  of  whom  Jesus  is  tbe  Prophet  and  Eevealer?  Will  that  satisfy 
the  religious  need?  And  is  the  Christian  wrong  in  interpreting  his 
experience  as  an  effect  of  which  Jesus  is  the  present,  extra-historical 
cause  ? 

Should  we  pray  to  Jesus?  To  be  sure,  the  God  of  the  Christian  is 
just  like  Jesus  in  disposition  and  bearing  toward  us.  Can  we  not  re- 
gard God  as  the  true  object  of  religious  faith  and  prayer,  and  yet 
have  that  faith  and  prayer  different  from  what  they  would  be,  if  God 
were  not  interpreted  in  terms  of  Jesus?  The  primacy  and  suprem- 
acy of  the  God-idea  are  impaired  if  aught  but  God  is  made  the  object 
of  prayer.  Is  prayer  to  Jesus  saint-worship?  Would  Jesus  have  al- 
lowed worship  of  himself,  and  the  erecting  of  him  into  the  dignity  of 
God?  If  Jesus  did  bind  men  to  himself,  the  end  was  to  bind  men  to 
God. 

What  shall  we  say  of  the  idea  that  Christianity  is  the  only  true 
religion?  Is  it  not  as  unreasonable  to  say  that  Christianity  is  the 
.only  true  religion  as  to  say  that  tbe  English  language  is  the  only  true 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OP  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     155 

language?  Are  "true"  and  "false"  the  right  terms  to  apply? 
Aren't  "  useful "  and  "  good  "  better  terms  ?  Still,  we  may  express 
the  opinion  that  Christianity  and  the  English  language  are  going  to 
win  out  in  the  struggle  for  existence.  But  is  it  correct  to  say  that 
the  English  language  is  a  favorite  with  God  ?  Or  that  the  Christian 
religion  is?  How  different  the  old  Christian  religion  and  the  old 
English  language  from  their  present  forms ! 

2.  There  are  three  ways  of  viewing  the  being  and  work  of 
Jesus:     (a)   The  empirical,  historical  treatment.     This  seeks 
on  the  basis  of  critical  investigation  of  the  sources  to  establish 
the  facts  of  the  life  and  work  of  Jesus,     (b)   The  ethical  treat- 
ment.    This  is  guided  by  the  question,  What  worth  and  what 
dignity  does  the  religio-ethical  personality  of  Jesus,  which  we 
meet  in  the  gospels,  have  in  and  of  itself?     (c)   The  religious 
treatment.     This  asks  the  following  question,  What  importance 
and  significance  does  the  person  of  Jesus  have  for  us  by  virtue 
of  the  effects  proceeding  from  him  and  which  we  know  from 
experience  ?     Also  the  further  question,  What  have  we  to  say, 
on  the  basis  of  these  effects,  concerning  the  relation  of  Jesus 
to  God  and  to  men  ? 

3.  How  now  are  these  three  views,  the  historical,  the  ethical 
and  the  religious,  related  to  each  other?     (a)  If  we  relate  the 
historical  consideration  to  the  ethical  and  religious  we  find  (a) 
the  former  cannot  mount  to  judgment  of  faith.     Conversely  the 
ethical  and  religious  judgment  concerning  Jesus  cannot  be  made 
dependent  upon  historical  critical  work  with  its  slow  progress, 
its  manifold  arguments  of  mere  probability  and  its  limitation 
to  technical  scholarship.1     (j8)  Yet  historical  work  has  an  in- 
direct worth  for  faith,  viz.  it  can  help  to  prepare  for  faith,  and 
it  can  enrich  and  clarify  faith.     To  be  sure,  on  its  side  it 
draws  from  the  ethical   and  the  religious  considerations  the 
impulse  to  true  self-restraint,  to  scientific  sobriety.     It  also 
draws  from  the  ethical  and  the  religious  important  points  of 
view,  problems  and  questions,     (b)   If  we  relate  the  ethical 
and  religious  to  one  another  we  find  the  following:     (a)   The 
ethical  consideration  is  necessary  presupposition  for  the  reli- 
gious.    The  former  with  inner  necessity  leads  to  the  latter, 
and  finds  its  fulfilment  and  fruition  in  the  latter.2     (/?)  But 
it  is  the  religious  consideration  that  is  directly  fundamental 


156      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

for  dogmatic  Christology,  and  this  corresponds  to  the  general 
Protestant  position :  "  to  know  Christ  is  to  experience  his  bene- 
fits "  (Melanchthon).3 

Notes  to  §85 :  3 

1.  Historical  Biblical  science  cannot  destroy  our  faith.  Can  the 
scientific  explanation  of  the  rainbow  destroy  our  value-judgment  as 
to  its  beauty?  How  can  I  know,  simply  by  passing  the  existence- 
judgment  regarding  Jesus,  whether  he  is  to  be  evaluated  as  revelation 
of  God  or  not? 

Let  us  suppose  that  the  judgment  of  faith  must  wait  upon  historical 
science.  When  shall  we  be  free  to  be  religious?  We  have  had  a 
hundred  years  of  the  synoptic  problem  already.  Much  of  the  outcome 
of  historical  science  is  problematic.  The  work  is  limited  to  technical 
scholarship.  What  is  Aunt  Dinah  down  South  going  to  do  about  it? 
Or  the  scientific  pagan  in  the  laboratory?  How  is  he  to  be  made 
scientifically  certain  of  the  physical  resurrection  of  Jesus  as  historic 
fact?  Is  that  the  evangelical  process  of  salvation?  That  would  be 
salvation,  not  by  grace  but  by  very  hard  work.  Or  else  it  would  be 
substituting  for  the  external  authority  of  the  priest  the  external 
authority  of  the  historian.  Faith  would  lose  its  spontaneity.  The 
modern  man  would  be  no  better  off  than  the  charcoal  man  who  told 
Luther  he  believed  the  teachings  of  the  Church,  but  could  not  tell 
what  those  teachings  were.  ''What  do  you  believe?"  "I  believe 
what  the  historical  critics  believe."  "And  what  do  they  believe?" 
"  I  don't  know."  There  is  no  inner  certainty  here.  Can  anything 
which  the  historical  critical  scientist,  as  such,  is  able  to  say  be  a  mat- 
ter of  religious  faith?  Is  it  an  object  of  religious  faith  that  Jesus 
walked  on  the  sea?  No,  and  the  same  is  true  of  other  events  of  the 
life  of  Jesus.  But  the  object  of  religious  faith  is  there  in  Jesus. 
Historical  science  might  conceivably  destroy  knowledge  of  Jesus. 
But  faith  is  directed  toward  that  which  is  timeless.  The  object  of 
faith  is  an  eternal  content;  not  facts,  but  values.  And  so  it  is  not 
he  who  has  not  the  historico-critical  scientific  conviction  concerning 
Jesus  who  is  none  of  his,  but  he  who  has  not  the  spirit  of  Christ  that 
is  none  of  his.  Salvation  is  by  character,  not  by  knowledge. 

Science  is  never  done.  It  is  its  business  to  criticize.  It  makes 
Jesus  a  problem.  The  Jesus  of  history  will  never  again  cease  to  be  a 
problem.  But  the  object  to  which  religious  faith  is  directed  cannot 
be  shaken  by  historico-critical  science;  it  will  be  shaken  on  grounds  of 
life,  if  at  all.  Herrmann  and  even  Cremer  says  that  to  require  a  man 
to  hold  historic  facts  to  be  real  as  a  condition  of  his  becoming  a  Chris- 
tian is  sin.  The  ground  on  which  alone  you  have  the  right  to  require 
a  man  to  hold  that  a  fact  of  history  took  place  is  that  it  took  place, 
and  the  only  way  of  finding  out  that  it  took  place  is  by  scientific  in- 
vestigation. (Is  that  being  saved  by  grace?)  It  is  not  that  histor- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     157 

ico-critical  study  may  not  yield  rich  values  in  personalities  for  faith. 
But  religious  faith  must  not  wait  upon  scientific  investigation.  Is 
not  inner  certainty  the  very  root  and  core  of  religious  faith?  But 
how  could  you  have  that  inner  certainty  if  your  religious  faith  was 
grounded  upon  scientific  investigation?  And  how  could  God  be  good 
and  make  it  necessary  to  guarantee  what  happened  two  thousand 
years  ago  before  religious  faith  could  find  place  in  the  life?  Knowl- 
edge is  a  conviction  of  the  reality  and  connection  of  things,  grounded 
on  experience  of  the  senses  and  on  the  laws  of  thought.  But  re- 
ligious faith  is  a  conviction  that  there  is  a  meaning  in  things,  and 
that  that  meaning  is  good.  There  is  nothing  in  time  which  cannot 
be  in  all  time  which  can  be  the  true  object  of  faith. 

Systematic  statement  of  the  relation  between  historic  fact  and  re- 
ligious faith.  (1)  We  are  placed  in  a  stream  of  rich,  historical,  or- 
ganic life.  This  stream  brings  us  values  which  inwardly  enrich  us, 
which  make  us  free,  which  redeem  us,  which  lift  us  above  ourselves. 
Those  values  are  mediated  to  us  by  parents,  teachers,  friends,  words, 
deeds,  languages,  etc.  Through  these  media  values  are  brought  to  us 
which  we  of  ourselves  are  not  able  to  produce  out  of  ourselves.  That 
is,  the  individual  man  is  infinitely  poor  as  compared  with  the  wealth 
of  history  in  which  God  has  placed  us.  This  wealth  brings  us  spir- 
itual values  which  man  in  isolated  life  would  never  have  invented  or 
discovered.  Nor  would  the  totality  of  men  have  done  so,  unless  in 
the  mystery  of  creative  personalities,  fructified  by  the  stream  of 
history,  fountains  had  been  opened  from  which  higher  values 
streamed  out  of  eternity  into  our  human  world.  Personalities  are  the 
channels  of  divine  grace  —  the  grace  by  which  the  Christian  is  re- 
deemed. (2)  The  medium  of  these  values,  of  this  grace,  is  not  sci- 
ence but  life.  Here  as  elsewhere  life  is  the  producer  of  life.  Noth- 
ing in  the  past  that  is  in  the  past  only,  and  not  also  in  the  present, 
belongs  to  the  essence  of  that  gospel  which  saves  and  sanctifies  the 
life.  Take,  for  example,  the  bodily  resurrection  of  Jesus.  This  is 
an  historical  fact,  or  something  affirmed  to  be  historical  fact.  As 
such  it  is  to  be  strictly  proved,  or  not  proved.  If  it  is  to  be  proved, 
it  is  to  be  proved  to  everybody,  even  the  most  unbelieving.  There- 
fore the  attitude  toward  it  is  independent  of  all  personal  disposition. 
If  it  is  not  to  be  cogently  proved,  religion  cannot  make  it  a  duty  to 
let  that  pass  as  proved  which  has  not  been  proved,  or  to  proceed  less 
conscientiously  or  less  critically  here  than  in  other  regions  of  histor- 
ical knowledge  and  of  science.  That  is  to  say,  the  acknowledgment 
of  a  single  historical  fact  is  a  thing  of  knowledge  and  not  of  re- 
ligious faith  at  all.  Religious  faith  can  be  directed  only  to  that 
which  is  of  a  timeless  character,  only  to  that,  therefore,  which  can 
be  immediately  present  to  everyone,  for  only  the  timeless  can  be  in 
all  time.  Whoever  inserts  an  historical  fact  in  the  place  of  this  time- 
less object  externalizes  faith,  detains  religion  at  a  lower  stage  which 
has  been  overcome  in  the  world-historical  movement,  and  complicates 


158      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

religion  in  an  insoluble  contradiction  with  all  the  rest  of  our  life.  It 
is  said  that  Christianity  collapses  with  the  collapse  of  faith  in  the 
bodily  resurrection,  but  on  what  is  faith  in  the  divine  truth  of  Chris- 
tianity founded?  Not  upon  some  datum  in  the  region  of  historical 
science,  but  upon  the  new  content  of  our  religion,  upon  its  new  world 
of  love  and  grace.  Is  this  new  world  an  illusion  without  the  bodily 
resurrection?  Let  us  not  substitute  "historical  faith"  for  the  omni- 
presence of  spiritual  and  divine  life.  Let  us  not  depart  from  a  re- 
ligion of  spirit  and  personality,  and  relapse  into  a  religion  of  signs 
and  wonders.  Christianity  is  not  a  religion  of  historical  facts.  It  is 
a  religion  of  spirit  and  of  personality.  Hence  let  us  cease  that  amal- 
gamating of  history  and  faith  which  has  brought  unspeakable  con- 
fusion upon  modern  humanity.  No  datum  of  history  as  such  is  an 
affair  of  religious  faith. 

2.  Our  moral  vocation,  the  discovery  and   production  of  values, 
leads  to  the  idea  that  if  our  work  in  the  world  produces  these  values, 
it  must  be  that  the  structure  of  the  world  is  such  as  makes  this  pos- 
sible.    The  end  of  the  world  is  thus  revealed.     Moral  work  neces- 
sarily leads  to  the  religious  view. 

3.  Note  how  certain  conceptions  of  the  past  were  not  originally 
fruitful,  but  have  been  taken  up  later  and  made  the  basis  of  a  sys- 
tem of  theology.     Thus  Melanchthon's  saying,  quoted  above,  is  the 
basis  of  the  Ritschlian  theology. 

§86.  Fundamental  Ethical  and  Religious  Judgment  concern- 
ing Jesus. 

1.  The  ethical  judgment  concerning  the  inner  worth  and  the 
loftiness  of  the  personality  of  Jesus  is  determined  by  the  con- 
cept of  vocation,  or  calling.  Every  ethical  evaluation  of  a  per- 
son, above  all  of  a  religio-ethical  personality,  with  inner  neces- 
sity leads  to  the  concept  of  vocation.  In  particular  this  is  valid 
for  Jesus,  so  far  as  he  himself  subsumed  his  whole  life  and 
work  under  the  point  of  view  of  a  divine  calling.  The  ethical 
judgment  is  directed  to  two  points,  viz.:  (a)  The  loftiness 
or  greatness  of  the  calling  of  Jesus.  The  calling  of  Jesus  to 
save  souls  and  to  usher  in  the  kingdom  of  God  was  according 
to  his  view  supramundane,  and  yet  on  the  other  hand,  it  com- 
prehended the  world.  It  is  true  that  Jesus  did  leave  to  one 
side  in  his  calling  various  important  phases  of  the  human  cul- 
tural life.1  This  limitation  is  only  a  sign  of  the  concentration 
of  Jesus  upon  one  goal,  that  was  to  him  all-important.  But 
that  this  goal  was  really  God's  will,  this  calling  really  God's 
work  for  us,  can  be  maintained  only  in  the  religious  judgment. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     159 

(b)  The  measure  of  the  fulfilment  of  his  vocation  on  the  part 
of  Jesus.  Ethical  judgment  concerning  this  can  only  declare 
that  the  picture  and  self-witness  reveal  no  gaps  or  defects  in 
the  fulfilment  of  his  vocation.  We  have  rather  an  example  of 
extreme  fidelity.  On  the  other  hand  the  conviction  of  the 
perfect  fidelity  and  sinlessness  of  Jesus  can  be  gained  only 
through  a  religious  judgment,  a  judgment  of  faith.2 
Notes  to  §86 : 1 

1.  The  old  Socinian  position  was  that  the  only  value  of  Jesus  was 
his  instability.     But  how  many  things  were  left  out  of  the  model! 
Science,  art,  patriotism,  perpetuity  of  family,  social  reform,  the  life 
of  gain,  city  sanitation,  and  so  on.     What  did  Jesus  care  for  what 
we  call  "  civilization  "  ?     He  did  not  think  there  was  going  to  be  any 
twentieth  century,  or  a  future  of  the  race  in  the  sense  in  which  there 
has  been.     Then  bow  could  be  be  expected  to  have  an  interest  in  art 
and  science  and  philosophy  and  discovery  and  invention?     Indeed, 
it  would  be  hard  to  pick  a  man  more  unlike  the  modern  man  than 
Jesus. 

And  yet,  entirely  consistent  with  this  is  the  fact  that  it  is  just  the 
deep  binding  of  the  life  of  the  modern  man  to  Jesus  that  saves  the 
modern  man.  Outer  detachment  from  him  is  called  for,  and  inner 
union  with  him.  Disobedience  to  his  words  at  times,  but  obedience 
to  his  inner  spirit.  Can  the  modern  man  give  himself,  without  re- 
serve, to  art,  to  science,  to  philosophy,  to  politics,  to  the  life  of  gain, 
and  in  so  doing  be  a  disciple  of  the  Man  of  Galilee,  who  had  no 
interest  in  any  of  these  things?  Or  must  even  the  modern  man  press 
on  a  peg  to  the  point  where  he  shall  see  that  none  of  these  things  is  of 
absolute  worth,  but  that  personality  is?  The  origination  and  con- 
summation and  conservation  of  personality  is  the  great  end,  and 
that  for  which  Jesus  cared.  Purity  and  strength  and  maturity  of 
inner  disposition  —  in  these  things  there  can  be  likeness  to  Jesus, 
even  in  the  midst  of  outward  dissimilarity. 

2.  Was  Jesus  sinless?     How  can  you  find  out  whether  he  was  or 
not?     The  Church's  conception  of  his  sinlessness  is  such  as  to  ex- 
clude moral  development  in  Jesus,  and  as  to  remove  him  from  being 
an  example  to  man.     A  marble  coldness  of  a  dogmatic  sinlessness 
does  not  appeal  to  man.     If  it  was  a  gift  to  Jesus,  not  a  moral  task 
to  Jesus,  it  lias  no  moral  value  for  man.     But  sinlessness  through 
struggle  against  temptation  is  of  supreme  value.     Whether  Jesus  was 
sinless  or  not  cannot  be  made  out  by  historical  science;  the  data  are 
too  meager.     The  one  sentence  about  which  there  need  be  no  doubt 
that  Jesus  uttered  it  —  if  this  can  be  said  of  any  of  his  recorded 
sayings  —  is  the  question,  "Why  callest  thou  me  good?"     And  it  is 
sanctimonious  superficiality  to  spirit  away  such  words.     Jesus  knew 
sin,  not  through  omniscience,  but  through  personal  fight   with  it. 


160      CHRISTIANITY  IX  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Yet  there  is  no  evidence  of  a  breach  with  the  past,  no  evidence  that 
he  was  ever  a  penitent.  His  cull  to  repentance  does  not  prove  his 
sinlessness,  though  it  may  have  had  that  for  its  background. 

It  is  often  said  that  the  moral  sublimity  of  Jesus  cannot  be  un- 
derstood at  all;  that  it  is  incomprehensible,  and  therefore  unhuman. 
But  who  ever  did  fathom  the  depths  of  the  life  of  any  epoch-making 
personality?  It  is  not  within  the  capacity  of  moral  science  to  pene- 
trate into  the  mystery  of  personality.  Even  the  lowest  as  well  as  the 
best  of  all  personalities  is  incomprehensible.  In  so  far  as  it  can  be 
apprehended  and  known  at  all,  it  is  to  be  apprehended  and  known,  not 
scientifically,  but  personally. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  if  there  ever  had  been  any  moral  imper- 
fection in  Jesus,  the  scars  would  have  been  left  in  his  moral  con- 
sciousness. But  psychology  does  not  show  this  to  be  necessarily  true. 
There  is  a  power  of  regenerating  the  injured  cell,  even  in  physical 
life,  and  the  defects  of  youth  do  not  necessarily  leave  scars  forever. 

In  short,  the  proposition  that  Jesus  was  sinless  is  a  proposition  of 
dogmatics,  not  of  historical  science.  It  is  a  religious  value- judgment. 
Jesus,  as  evinced  by  my  experience  of  his  power  to  make  my  life  over 
anew,  and  who  becomes  Lord  of  my  life,  cannot  be  evaluated  any 
lower  than  in  the  value-judgment  that  he  was  sinless.  The  word 
"  sinlessness "  is  unfortunate,  because  negative.  It  were  better  to 
speak  of  the  religious  and  moral  perfection  of  Jesus.  The  value- 
judgment  in  which  this  is  affirmed  is  made  on  the  basis  of  the  effect 
of  his  personality  on  the  Christian  community.  Let  us  place  the 
matter,  then,  on  its  proper  basis.  Do  not  seek  to  base  the  judgment 
on  scientific  investigation;  the  facts  do  not  necessitate  it.  Claim 
it,  rather,  on  the  basis  of  your  inner  experience. 

2.  The  fundamental  religious  judgment  affirms  the  salva- 
tion-bringing efficacy  of  Jesus,  of  which  we  become  certain 
through  trust  in  bis  person,  (a)  Jesus  awakens  in  us  the  con- 
sciousness of  guilt  and  of  the  power  of  sin,  but  with  this  at  the 
same  time  the  consciousness  of  our  divine  calling  and  destiny.1 
(b)  Jesus  abrogates  the  guilt  of  sin  by  receiving  us  into  the 
fellowship  of  bis  love  which  seeks  the  sinner.2  (c)  Jesus  oper- 
ates against  the  power  of  sin  by  means  of  the  impulses  and 
spiritual  forces  issuing  from  him.  (d)  Jesus  transforms  the 
evil  connected  with  sin  into  a  blessing.  All  these  benefits  may 
not  be  disengaged  from  the  person  of  Jesus.3  The  untenabil- 
ity  of  the  distinction  in  its  traditional  form  between  principle 
and  person  becomes  clear  to  us  in  the  measure  that  the  loftiness 
of  the  world  of  Christian  faith  above  all  phenomena  of  the 
world  comes  to  consciousness ;  above  all  in  the  measure  that 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     101 

the  depth  of  the  guilt,  power  and  punishment  of  sin  conies  to 
consciousness.  Therefore  the  religious  judgment  concerning 
the  saving  efficacy  of  Jesus  Christ  may  be  expressed  in  the 
words,  Jesus  Christ  himself  our  Redeemer,  or  Savior.4 

Notes  to  §86 :  2 

1.  Our  vocation  as  human  beings  is  to  become  personality.     We  are 
born  pre-personal,  or  sub-personal,  but  with  the  endowment  and  call- 
ing to  become  persons.     That  is  the  absolute  calling  of  man. 

2.  God  is  never  parted  from  any  human  being,  sinful  or  not;  but 
there  is  a  sense  of  separation  from  God,  and  that  is  the  basic  evil. 

3.  These  facts  of  experience  are  the  basis  on  which  we  pass  to  our 
value- judgment  of  Jesus.     He  must  be  as  great  as  is  necessitated  by 
such  facts.     This  personal  judgment  is  beyond  science,  but  it  may  be 
valid  for  all  that.     Does  not  a  mother  know  more  of  mother-love  than 
science  can  ever  teach? 

4.  We  are  not  saved  by  things  or  performances  or  institutions,  but 
by  persons.     Perhaps  a  better  word  than  "  saved "  or  "  redeemed " 
may  be  found  for  our  values.     These  words  do  not  quite  correspond 
to  the  notion  of  personality.     What  really  takes  place  is  that  mysteri- 
ous,   penetrating,    overpowering    influence   of   one   personality    over 
another.     One  personality  makes  another  over  again.     If  that  is  not 
being  saved,  what  is  being  saved?     It  is  not  being  snatched  from 
some  fate  which  is  extra-personal,  although  the  word  "  saved "  has 
had  and  still  bears  the  latter  connotation.     Being  saved  is  for  the 
bud  to  become  a  blossom  and  the  blossom  a  fruit.     But  no  theory, 
not  even  a  theory  of  personality,  will  save  a  personality,  any  more 
than  a  theory  of  fire  will  ignite  wood. 

b.  THE  SYSTEMATIC  DEVELOPMENT  OF  PROPOSITIONS  OF  FAITH 

CONCERNING  JESUS  CHRIST.     (TiiE  MAN  JESUS  AS 

MEDIATOR  BETWEEN  GOD  AND  MAN.) 

a.  The  Earthly  Life  of  Jesus  as  the  Being  of  God  in  Jesus  and 
as  the  Being  of  Jesus  in  God. 

§87.  An  Examination  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Doctrine  of  the 
Three-fold  Office  of  Christ. 

1.  Jesus'  relation  to  God  and  to  humanity  was  originally 
summed  up  in  the  Messianic  concept,  but  from  the  very  be- 
ginning there  has  been  the  need  of  an  interpretation  of  this 
concept.     We  have  such  an  interpretation  in  the  ecclesiastical 
doctrine  of  the  threefold  office  (Prophet,  Priest  and  King). 

2.  This  doctrine  of  the  Protestant  theology  (unus  triplex) 


162      CHRISTIANITY  IX  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

(a)  was  prepared  for  by  Biblical  ideas  which  were  already 
used  in  the  ancient  Church,  but  was  made  especially  fruitful 
in  the  Reformation,  and  was  systematized  by  John   Calvin. 

(b)  In  the  most  developed  form  of  this  doctrine  the  material 
of  the  life  and  work  of  Jesus  was  distributed  among  three  of- 
fices, and  each  of  these  three  offices  found  employment  under 
the  two  states  of  Christ. 

3.  As  to  its  content,  this  doctrine  has  its  worth  above  all  for 
edifying  exposition,  but  also  for  dogmatic  systematization.  It 
is  through  this  doctrine  that  what  Jesus  Christ  is  to  Christian- 
ity as  compared  with  the  Old  Testament  and  what  he  has 
brought  to  Christianity  may  be  interpreted.  Yet  upon  a  more 
accurate  evaluation  of  the  formal  construction  of  the  doctrine 
it  grows  clear  that  the  dilferent  material  cannot  always  be 
distributed  among  these  three  offices,  but  that  one  and  the 
same  material  of  the  life  of  Jesus  is  merely  subsumed  under 
different  points  of  view.  In  addition  to  this,  the  three  offices 
are  not  simply  co-ordinate  with  one  another.  It  is  for  this 
reason  that  the  traditional  doctrinal  form  has  rightly  been  im- 
proved, so  that  Jesus  as  kingly  prophet  on  God's  side  stands 
over  against  man,  and  as  kingly  priest  on  our  side  stands  over 
against  God. 

4.  These  two  leading  points  of  view  (kingly  prophet  and 
kingly  priest)  have  their  deeper  ground,  however,  in  the  two 
essential  relations  of  the  idea  of  "  Son  "  set  forth  in  the  Johan- 
nine  words  (u  the  Father  in  Me,  and  I  in  the  Father,"  or  "  I 
and  My  Father  are  one  ").  The  former,  the  being  of  God  in 
Jesus,  the  latter,  the  being  of  Jesus  in  God,  both  are  to  be 
developed,  each  for  itself  and  both  in  their  inner  unity.1 

Note  to  §87 :  4 

1.  It  is  not  a  mere  influence  or  manifestation  of  God,  but  the 
being,  the  reality  of  God  that  is  in  Jesus.  God  in  his  verity  is  there. 
When  we  know  the  inner  spirit  and  love  of  Jesus,  we  know,  in  very 
fact,  God.  We  know  him  in  his  deepest  depths.  There  is  no  docetic 
character  about  the  divine  in  Jesus,  no  mere  phenomenalizing  of  the 
divine.  In  our  modern  revolt  against  ontology  we  must  not  go  so  far 
as  to  deny  the  reality  in  fact  of  God  in  Jesus.  Otherwise  there  is  no 
revelation  in  Jesus. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     163 

§88.  God's  Being  in  Jesus.     Jesus  the  Bearer  of  Divine  Life. 

1.  The  being  of  God  in  Jesus  which  the  Christian  faith  ex- 
presses is  primarily  an  efficient  presence  of  God  in  Jesus'  own 
interior  life.     Here  the  central  point  is  inner  certainty  of  filial 
fellowship  with  the  heavenly  Father,     (a)   The  clear  knowl- 
edge of  his  Father  flows  from  this:     (a)   As  to  the  content  of 
this  knowledge,  it  is  related  to  God's  gracious  and  holy  will, 
to  man's  need,  to  his  own  relation  to  God,  and  to  his  vocation 
as  Savior,     (ft)  As  to  kind  this  knowledge  was  of  course  nour- 
ished by  Old  Testament  prophecy,  but  yet  for  all  that  it  was  an 
intuitive  knowledge  which  included  self-dependence  in  his  un- 
derstanding of  the  Scriptures  for  one  thing,  and  an  independ- 
ence of  the  religious  and  moral  prepossessions  of  his  time, 
(y)   But  this  knowledge,  according  to  Jesus'  own  testimony, 
had  its  limits.     It  was  not  omniscience  in  reference  to  all  the 
single  ways  of  God  looking  to  the  actualization  of  the  divine 
counsel;  it  was  not  independent  of  the  form  of  ideas  of  his 
time;  it  was  not  inerrant  in  questions  of  empirical  or  discur- 
sive knowledge,     (b)   In  Jesus'  will-attitudes  the  known  will 
of  God  gave  guidance,  not  in  the  form  of  a  psychological  com- 
pulsion, but  in  the  form  of  a  judgment  of  duty  and  of  effective 
ethical  stimulus  or  impulse.     As  to  the  content  of  his  will  it 
was  a  determination  of  his  will  by  God's  supreme  end.     The 
proof  of  this  was  his  sureness  in  his  conduct,  above  all  the 
energy  of  his  positive  (not  ascetic)  subordination  of  all  natural 
impulses  to  the  will  of  God  and  his  inner  triumph  over  all 
outer  opposition  and  hindrances,     (c)   In  Jesus'  emotional  at- 
titude his  union  with  God  is  mirrored  in  the  "  peace"  ("p^) 
and  "grace"   (xaP<0   arising  from  his  struggle,  issuing  from 
the  conflict  of  his  life. 

2.  But  the  being  of  God  in  Jesus'  interior  life  signifies  at 
the  same  time  the  presence  of  God  in  Jesus'  work  and  words, 
(a)   Jesus'  work  is  God's  work  for  us,  so  far  as  the  unitary 
relation  to  the  actualization  of  the  divine  redemptive  will  be- 
comes  directly    or    indirectly   manifest    therein.1     (b)   Jesus' 
word  is  God's  word  to  us  so  far  as  the  holy  and  gracious  will  of 
God  revealed  in  Jesus  is  thereby  made  known  to  us.     (c)   Con- 
cerning Jesus'  suffering  and  death  a  later  section  will  treat. 


164      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Note  to  §88 : 2 

1.  If  God  is  in  Jesus'  inner  life,  is  God  not  also  actually  in  Jesus' 
work? 

See  Daab's  article  in  Das  Suchen  der  Zeit,  Vol.  III. 

3.  Through  the  constant  presence  of  God  in  Jesus'  personal 
life  and  work  Jesus  is  climax  and  close  of  all  antecedent 
prophecy.  Christian  faith  in  Jesus  may  be  summed  up  in 
the  expression  that  the  fulness  of  deity  dwelt  in  his  personal 
life,  or  in  John's  phrase,  that  he  is  "  the  only-begotten  Son  of 
God."  l  The  essence  of  God  is  in  him,  livingly  active  there, 
but  in  the  form  and  limits  of  a  truly  personal  human  life.  In 
other  words,  God's  essence  is  in  Jesus  as  to  its  revealed  content, 
but  not  as  to  its  supramundane  form  of  life.2  s 
Notes  to  §88 :  3 

1.  It  is  growing  increasingly  difficult  to  teach  Christology.     The 
most  difficult  thing  in  systematic  theology  is  to  enunciate  Christolog- 
ical  propositions  which  are  verifiable  in  experience  or  demonstrable 
in  thought.     There  can  be  no  Christology  unless  to  the  existence- 
judgment,  "  Jesus  is  a  man,"  you  supply  a  spiritual  judgment,   a 
judgment  of  value  or  meaning.     Our  valuation  of  the  historical  man 
Jesus  is  to-day  and  is  to  be  henceforth  the  content  of  our  Christology. 
We  must  keep  fact  and  meaning  together. 

(The  worst  of  all  dualisms  is  the  separation  of  fact  and  meaning. 
One  instance  of  this  is  the  outlook  upon  joyless  labor  here  and  labor- 
less  joy  hereafter.) 

2.  The  supramundane  form  of  the  life  of  God  we  do  not  know 
from  Jesus.     The  word  "  person  "  seems  an  inadequate  word  to  apply 
to  God,  though  it  is  probably  the  best  we  can  do.     The  concept  of 
super-personality,  if  understood  as  denying  the  personal,  sinks  for 
us  to  the  sub-personal.     But  eliminate  from  human  personality  what 
it  seems  difficult  to  ascribe  to  God,  and  you  destroy  personality  as 
we  know  it.     In  himself,  God  is  Spirit;  for  us,  he  is  best  symbolized 
by  the  concept  "  person." 

3.  Would  the  Christian  life  be  impoverished  by  a  return  to  Jesus 
of  Nazareth  and  his  teaching,  to  the  exclusion  of  all  Christological 
predicates?     Or  must  you  supply  to  Jesus  some  great  metaphysical 
predicate,  to  have  a  religion  adequate  to  the  needs  of  men  (     The  Occi- 
dent believes  in  history.     The  Orient  believes  in  metaphysics  with- 
out history.     Can  you  take  the  merely  historical  Jesus  to  Oriental 
people,  and  do  missionary  work  on  that  basis?     Must  we  pass  from 
the  Jesus  of  history  to  something  metaphysical,  albeit  as  intelligible 
to  us  as  the  metaphysics  of  former  believers  was  to  them?     (Meta- 
physics is  not  essentially  different  from   value-judgments,   but  the 
question  is  as  to  the  sort  of  value- judgment.) 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS      165 

Is  not  the  solution  to  be  found  in  a  movement  forward  from  a 
Christocentric  theology  to  a  theocentric  theology,  wherein  God  shall 
be  interpreted  in  terms  of  the  personality  of  Jesus?  The  cry  of  the 
soul  is  not  for  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  but  for  the  living  God,  not  a  God 
in  the  past,  but  a  present,  accessible  God.  And  yet  that  God  must 
not  be  interpreted  in  terms  of  any  other  than  Jesus  Christ,  the  best 
we  know.  Perhaps  it  would  be  good  enough  to  interpret  that  God  in 
terms  of  an  ideal  of  which  there  is  no  counterpart  in  historic  reality; 
but  it  is  better  if  we  can  find  a  real  counterpart  and  if  Jesus'  inner 
purpose  of  will  can  be  made  the  basis  of  the  interpretation.  This  idea 
of  God  in  Jesus  and  Jesus  in  God  will  make  the  Christian  religion 
cosmopolitan,  as  the  Logos-religion  was  at  an  earlier  time.  Supple- 
menting the  watchword,  "  Back  to  Jesus,"  with  this  other,  "  Back  from 
Jesus  to  God  " ;  interpreting  God  in  terms  of  Jesus  and  thus  reading 
the  night-side  of  reality  in  terms  of  the  day-side,  our  theology,  being 
theocentric  as  well  as  Christian,  will  once  again  win  the  world. 

4.  The  objection  that  this  faith  expresses  no  metaphysical 
relation  to  God,  but  only  an  ethical  personal  relation,  rests  on 
a  false  antithesis,  for  in  truth  this  ethical  personal  relation 
is  the  supreme  metaphysical  reality,  reposing  on  the  living 
activity  of  God,  through  which  the  whole  temporal  develop- 
ment of  Jesus'  life  was  determined  from  the  beginning,  ever 
according  to  its  stages,  however.  In  addition,  the  question 
how  far  the  relation  of  the  earthly  life  of  Jesus  to  God  points 
beyond  and  above  that  earthly  life  must  be  left  open  here. 


§89.  God's  Being  in  Jesus.     Jesus  the  Bringer  of  Divine  Life 

in  Us. 

1.  By  means  of  the  being  of  God  in  Jesus  he  is  able  to  es- 
tablish a  divine  life  like  his  own  in  those  that  have  faith  in 
him.  Through  the  holy  love  of  God  present  and  active  in 
Jesus,  believers  are  not  only  accepted  into  a  relation  of  free- 
dom from  guilt,  but  become  on  the  basis  of  this  freedom  them- 
selves the  bearers  of  the  divine  life  and  the  organs  of  the  di- 
vine activity.  They  become  such  in  knowledge,  feeling  and 
willing,  in  work  and  words;  they  participate  in  the  royal 
prophetism  of  Jesus  himself,  and  this  effect  is  manifest  on  the 
individual,  within  the  Christian  community,  in  which  influ- 
ences of  the  divine  life  stream  to  the  members  of  the  com- 
munity from  Jesus  Christ  as  the  Head.1 


166      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Note  to  §89 : 1 

1.  "  Extra  ecclesiam  nulla  salus."     This  is  not  true  of  the  external 
institution,  but  only  of  the  spiritual  Church. 

You  can  teach  the  Bible  and  the  history  of  religion,  but  you  can- 
not teach  religion,  any  more  than  you  can  teach  love.  Religion  must 
be  experienced  by  virtue  of  our  religious  endowment  and  through  reci- 
procity with  religious  people.  A  good  personality  in  the  Sunday- 
School  teacher  is  more  important  than  scientific  knowledge  of  the 
Bible. 

2.  This  work  of  Jesus  must  be  apprehended  in  its  kind, 
not  as  magical,  nature-like,   not  rationalistically,  not  aesthet- 
ically, but  as  of  an  ethical  and  historical  character,  mediated 
by  personal  trust  in  him  as  the  bringer  of  the  divine  forgive- 
ness.    As  such  it  is  comparable  with  ethical  influences  which 
proceed  from  person  to  person  within  the  relations  of  human 
personal  authority.     Is  this  work  of  Jesus,  however,  unique 
as  to  content,  scope  and  effectiveness  ?  l 

Note  to  §89 : 2 

1.  The  new  thing  in  Jesus  is  not  his  teaching,  but  himself.  His 
kind  of  fellowship  with  God,  his  God-consciousness,  is  unique.  If 
you  understand  by  uniqueness  a  degree  of  intensiveness  which  is 
unsurpassed,  such  a  uniqueness  you  would  seem  to  have  to  affirm  of 
the  God-consciousness  of  Jesus.  But  if  it  were  entirely  different  in 
kind,  it  would  be  incommunicable,  and  so  we  should  not  have  a  gospel. 
I  am  not  quite  clear,  however,  that  "unique"  is  a  good  word  to  use. 
It  has  been  for  about  a  generation  a  pale  survival  of  the  Second  Per- 
son of  the  Trinity  idea.  Why  should  we  not  speak  of  the  representa- 
tiveness of  Jesus,  instead  of  his  uniqueness?  A  unique  apple  might 
be  the  worst  instead  of  the  best.  But  the  best  may  be  taken  as  a 
representative  specimen,  showing  to  what  extent  the  ideal  is  realizable. 

If  there  is  a  new  thing  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  it  is  his  convic- 
tion of  the  infinite  worth  of  human  personality  in  the  sight  of  God. 
He  includes  everyone  —  publicans,  harlots,  lepers,  outcasts,  little  chil- 
dren. Jesus  did  not  quite  have  the  now  popular  cry  of  the  universal 
brotherhood  of  man;  rather  was  it  the  infinite  worth  of  man.  And 
this  he  did  not  get  by  empirical  observation ;  he  judged  it  on  the  basis 
of  his  own  feeling,  his  own  consciousness  of  being  a  child  of  God. 

In  the  main  I  believe  we  are  able  to  say  what  Jesus  was,  though  we 
have  not  finished  our  historical  work  yet.  The  scientific  study  of 
Jesus  of  Nazareth  has  about  reached  the  point  where  it  is  going  to 
stay.  Whether  or  not  Jesus  held  that  he  himself  was  the  Messiah  may 
not  be  finally  settled,  however,  and  perhaps  never  will  be. 

Christianity  is  an  historical  religion  —  not  a  religion  of  historical 
facts,  but  of  spirit  and  personality.  The  relation  between  history  and 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     167 

values  is  the  relation  between  the  garden  and  the  flowers  that  grow 
therein.  The  values  are  grown  in  the  soil  of  history.  It  is  not  the 
soil  that  you  admire  aesthetically,  but  the  flowers. 

3.  Even  if  those  who  believe  in  Jesus  become  themselves 
bearers  and  organs  of  the  divine  life,  they  yet  remain  in  a 
position  of  dependence  upon  Jesus  by  virtue  of  their  attitude 
of  faith.     In  other  words,  Jesus  is  the  original,  perfect  and 
permanent  bearer  and  mediator  of  divine  life  —  the  personal 
fountain  of  that  life. 

4.  In  this  whole  view  of  the  being  and  work  of  God  in  Jesus 
the  first  and  primary  interest  which  church  doctrine  in  its 
Christology  would  validate  is  preserved.1 

Note  to  §89 :  4 

1.  I  seek  always  to  lash  as  closely  to  the  conservative  position  and 
to  the  Church-experience  as  is  possible  in  the  interests  of  truth. 

Yet  I  have  won  my  academic  freedom  by  the  hardest  kind  of  strug- 
gle, and  I  am  not  going  to  part  with  it. 

There  is  a  growing  number  of  those  whose  faith  will  go  to  pieces 
unless  these  modern  critical  conceptions  are  made  accessible  to  them. 
So  I  wish  to  bring  in  the  newer  truth  just  as  fast  as  it  is  serviceable 
to  the  people. 

§90.  Jesus'   Being  in   God.     Jesus  the  Perfect  Man,   Well- 
Pleasing  to  God. 

1.  Since  the  being  of  God  in  Jesus  is  actualized  in  his  ethico- 
religious  personal  life,  the  work  of  God  in  his  inner  life  which 
is  the  basis  of  his  personal  life  must  be  received  by  Jesus  him- 
self in  free  surrender  of  will  to  God.  Therefore  the  being  of 
Jesus  in  God  forms  the  necessary  obverse  side  to  the  being 
of  God  in  Jesus.  This  being  of  Jesus  in  God  is  set  forth  in  a 
two-fold  proposition  of  faith,  (a)  Jesus  fulfilled  his  vocation 
in  perfect  fidelity.  This  fidelity  consists  (a)  in  the  perfect 
love  of  Jesus  to  God,  therefore  in  entire  faith  and  obedience 
toward  his  heavenly  Father;  (/?)  in  the  perfect  love  of  Jesus 
to  man  who  is  to  be  saved.  In  both  these  ways  he  lives  en- 
tirely in  God's  holy  will  of  love,  thus  accrediting  himself  as 
Son  of  God.  (b)  Faith  in  Jesus'  perfect  fidelity  to  his  voca- 
tion includes  faith  in  his  "  sinlessness "  (but  see  §86:1,  b, 
for  a  criticism  of  the  word).  This  sinlessness  becomes  cer- 


168      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

tain  to  us  through  our  confidence  or  trust  in  him  as  a  sin-for- 
giving Savior.  But  as  to  the  content  of  this  sinlessness  it  may 
be  defined  neither  in  a  naturalistic  nor  in  a  legalistic  manner. 
This  is  best  avoided,  however,  by  making  the  idea  of  fidelity 
rather  than  of  sinlessness  the  primary  one.1 

Note  to  §90 : 1 

1.  Naturalistically,  historically  you  cannot  demonstrate  the  resur- 
rection of  Jesus ;  but  faith  will  say  it  cannot  be  that  personality  of 
the  content  found  in  the  historic  Jesus  should  be  left  to  go  into  non- 
existence. 

2.  A  two-fold  proposition  of  faith  is  further  included   in 
what  has  just  been  set  forth,      (a)   Since  Jesus  as  Son  lives  in 
the  Father  he  fulfils  or  perfects  the  destination  of  man  to  the 
religio-ethical  ideal  of  divine  sonship.     Not  as  mere  central 
Man,  lacking  individuality,  but  in  his  own  special  personality 
and  ministry,  Jesus  actualizes  the  chief  goal  of  a  true  God- 
man,  a  goal  valid  for  all  men.      (b)   But  since  this  is  the  di- 
vine destiny  of  man,  Jesus'  person  is  absolutely  worthful  be- 
fore God,  or  he  is  the  object  of  the  supreme  divine  good  pleas- 
ure, and  he  is  this  all  the  more  as  he  actualizes  the  will  of  God 
not  only  in  himself,  but  also  in  those  who  have  faith  in  him. 

§91.  Jesus'  Being  in  God.     Jesus  Our  Representative  before 
God. 

1.  Since  the  divine  life  which  Jesus  Christ  communicates 
to  the  believer  (§89)  as  well  as  the  divine  life  in  himself  (§88) 
comes  to  actualization  as  ethical  personal  life,  the  efficiency  of 
Jesus  Christ  necessarily  appears  to  us  under  this  point  of  view 
at  the  same  time.  The  corresponding  proposition  of  faith  then 
is  as  follows:  Jesus  will  and  can  in  priestly  service  uplift 
us  also  to  a  being  in  God  which  is  like  his  own:  i.  e.  (a)  to  true 
love  toward  God -and  man  (v.  §90:  2,  a)  ;  (b)  to  the  fulfilment 
of  our  human  destiny  to  become  ethico-religious  personalities 
(v.  §90:3,  a),  and  (c)  to  that  inner  state  in  which  we  are 
well-pleasing  to  God.  In  this  relation  also  Jesus  is  our 
"  Head,"  or  is  the  "  Firstborn  "  or  "  First-Fruit,"  or  "  Author 
and  Captain  "  of  faith,  like  to  whom  we  ourselves  are  to  be- 
come.1 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     169 

Note  to  §91 : 1 

1.  Dogmatics  may  use  pictorial  language,  but  philosophy  may  not 
use  it. 

2.  But  how  do  we  become  like  Jesus  Christ  ?     This  is  desig- 
nated by  another  idea  of  faith  which  is  connected  with  the  be- 
ing of  Jesus  in  God,  viz.:     Jesus  as  Royal  Priest  (§87:  3)  is 
at  the  same  time  our  Representative,  or  Advocate,  or  Intecessor 
before  God.      (a)   There  is  a  distinction  between  Jesus  as  our 
Representative,  and  Jesus  as  our  "  Head,"  or  the  "  Firstborn," 
or  "  First-Fruit."     In  the  latter  we  bring  to  our  consciousness 
likeness  with  Jesus  Christ ;  in  the  former,  difference  from  him, 
i.  e.  we  set  his  worth  over  against  our  unworth.     Moreover  we 
comfort  ourselves  with  the  idea  that  he  with  his  worthful  life 
appears  before  God  on  our  behalf  and  that  we  are  accepted 
before  God  on  his  account.1     (b)   This  concept  has  its  his- 
torical basis  (a)   in  a  series  of  Scriptural  ideas,  e.  g.  the  in- 
tercession of  Christ,  and   (ft)   in  the  history  of  ecclesiastical 
doctrine,  for  the  thought  of  the  merit  of  Jesus  Christ  has  been 
uniformly  emphasized  in  the  Occident  and  revivified  at  the 
Reformation,     (c)   But  the   concept  also  has  its  good   inner 
basis  in  Christian  faith  and  life  itself.     The  guilt-laden  con- 
science harbors  the  question  of  doubt  whether  the  holy  God 
can  really  meet  us  in  love  and  whether  we  dare  appear  before 
God  in  our  guilt.2     A  thoroughly  justifiable  way  —  a  way  in- 
dispensable to  the  fearful  conscience  —  is  the  reflection  of  faith 
that  Jesus  Christ  is  certainly  the  perfect  object  of  the  divine 
good  pleasure,  and  that  we  may  dare  approach  the  holy  God, 
not  with  an  appeal  to  our  worth,  but  to  Jesus  Christ's  inter- 
cession for  us,  and  to  our  belonging  in  faith  to  him.     Jesus  is 
thus  the  climax  and  end  of  all  antecedent  priesthood  and  sacri- 
fice.3     (d)   But  there  are  false  thoughts  to  be  reflected,  such 
as  (a)  an  alteration  of  God,  making  him  more  favorably  dis- 
posed (instead  of  this,  it  is  a  representation  by  a  part,  and  by 
the  merit  of  a  part,  of  the  potential  worth  of  the  whole)  ;  or 
(j8)  the  juristic  character  of  intercession.     Jesus  has  his  worth 
before  God  as  our  intercessor  only  by  means  of  his  God-given 
power  of  ethical  work  upon  us.     Moreover,  the  goal  of  that  ever 
necessary  reflection  of  faith  must  be  that  we  attain  through  the 
confrontation  of  Jesus  and  God  to  a  believing  knowledge  of  the 


170      CHKISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODEKN  EXPKESSION 

redeeming  God  himself  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  that  we  also  at- 
tain to  a  certainty  of  the  full  unity  of  God's  holiness  and  love. 

Notes  to  §91 : 2 

1.  There  is  a  profound  sense  in  which  we  do  not  become  like  Jesus 
at  all.     We  must  get  rid  of  the  old  static,  copy-theory  of  knowledge 
and  morality  and  religion.     The  function  of  history  in  religion  is  to 
facilitate  our  participation  in  the  eternal.     And  the  basic  religious 
process  is  our  participation  in  the  eternal.     Our  becoming  like  Jesus 
means  our  participation  in  the  eternal  values  which  have  their  home 
in  him ;  and  this  participation  is  an  active  process.     It  is  not  even 
copying  that  life  in  its  inner  psychological  form.     We  are  not  saved 
by  facts  of  history,  even  by  the  facts  of  redemptive  history  (Heils- 
thatsachen) ;  we  are  saved  by  values.     Getting  values  from  past  his- 
tory is  like  getting  seeds  for  our  garden,  but  growing  values  in  the 
present  is  like  growing  flowers  in  our  garden.     We  do  not  copy  the 
flowers  of  the  past,  but  the  new  flowers  will  be  like  those  of  the  past, 
probably. 

2.  Is  this  pathological,  or  is  it  a  real  fact  of  religious  experience 
to-day?     There  is  a  superficial  humanitarianism  which  indicates  the 
impoverishment  of  the  inner  world  of  man.     Keligion  has  lost  its 
depths.     We  are  distraught.     Religion  has  become  a  multiplicity  of 
things  to  be  done.     Our  weakness  to-day  is  that  we  have  lost  our 
souls.     We  must  reconquer  and  regain  an  inner  world.     In  our  path- 
ological sensitiveness  to  discomfort  and  pain,  our  inability  to  be 
poor  and  to  do  without  carpets  and  hammocks  and  the  like,  we  show 
the  beggarliness  of  our  spiritual  condition. 

3.  Is  there  any  practical  significance  in  the  traditional  thought  of 
the  intercession  of  Christ?     The  presence  of  a  representative  speci- 
men, showing  what  the  potentialities  of  the  species  are,  is  a  sort  of 
intercession  on  behalf  of  the  rest  of  the  species.     (Is  it  due  to  this 
line  of  thought  having  dropped  out  of  modern  religious  life  to  such 
an  extent,  that  it  seems  so  hard  to  render  intelligible  the  idea  of 
Christ  as  our  Intercessor?) 

3.  It  is  only  when  we  have  thus  gained  confidence  or  trust 
in  Jesus  Christ  as  Mediator  and  bringer  of  the  sin-forgiving 
grace  of  God  that  under  the  influence  of  his  communicating 
work  (§89)  we  attain  to  a  life  in  God  with  him,  our  Leader 
and  Lord,  and  that  we  become  like  him  as  our  Exemplar.     But 
this  thought  carries  us  over  into  Christian  ethics. 

4.  In  this  conception  of  the  being  of  Jesus  in  God,  and  of 
Jesus   as  our  Representative,   or  Head,   or  Fore-runner  and 
Intercessor,  the  second  interest  is  validated  which  ecclesiastical 
Protestantism  has  cared  to  preserve, 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     171 

§92.  The  Synthesis  of  the  Two  Points  of  View:  God  in  Jesus 
and  Jesus  in  God,  or  Jesus  as  the  Mediator  of  the  New 
Covenant. 

1.  The  two  series  of  thoughts  developed  in  §§88,  89  and  in 
§§90,  91  unite  in  a  total  view.     In  Jesus'  own  life  there  is  a 
union   (unition)   between  God's  being  and  work  and  human 
personality  on  the  soil  of  human  history.     A  new  fellowship 
between  God  and  humanity  is  actualized  through  him  in  the 
community  which  has  faith  in  him.     In  so  far  the  man  Jesus, 
on  the  basis  of  the  being  of  God  in  him,  is  the  Mediator  of 
the  perfect  righteousness. 

2.  Thus  Jesus  is  at  once  Head  and  Creator  of  a  new  spirit- 
ual humanity  in  God,  in  which  God  lives  and  works,  and  which 
on  its  side  uplifts  itself  to  God.     Jesus  thus  leads  humanity 
to  the  fulfilment  of  its  divine  destiny,  and  thus  he  conducts 
the  creative  purpose  of  God  to  a  conclusion  1  glorious  beyond 
all  human  speculation. 

Note  to  §92 :  2 

1.  There  are  two  ideas  of  evolution,  one  of  which  acknowledges, 
while  the  other  does  not  acknowledge  a  principle  of  activity  resi- 
dent in  reality.  (Activity  is  not  accounted  for;  it  is  discovered.) 
The  activistic  theory  of  evolution  makes  room  for  a  religion  in  which 
man,  especially  Jesus,  is  creative. 

3.  The  two-fold  conviction,  viz.  that  Jesus  was  the  bearer 
and  bringer  of  divine  life  and  work  during  his  earthly  life  (i.  e. 
was  Prophet),  and  that  he  was  at  the  same  time  the  perfect 
man,  well-pleasing  to  God,  and  thus  our  Exemplar  and  Head 
(i.  e.  was  Priest)  is  the  indispensable  basis  of  faith  in  Jesus 
as  Lord,  and  finds  its  unity  in  this  faith   (v.  §87:3),  while 
this  recognition  of  Jesus  as  Lord  and  king  points  to  faith  in 
him  as  the  exalted  one  at  the  same  time. 

4.  The  doctrine  of  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ  developed  in 
§§88  to  92  seeks  to  prosecute  the  fruitful  thought  further  and 
yet  avoid  the  byways  which  the  critical  survey  has  shown  us 
in  §§82,  84. 

5.  In  these  developed  propositions  we  have  the  presupposi- 
tions for  the  Christian  understanding  of  Jesus'  suffering  and 
death,  to  which  we  now  turn. 


172      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ft.  The  Suffering  and  Death  of  Jesus  as  Consummation  of  His 
Earthly  Life. 

§93.  The  Problem  and  the  Attempts  to  Solve  it  on  the  Part  of 
Church  Doctrine.  Evaluation  of  these  Attempts  and  Com- 
parison of  the  Same  with  the  Biblical  Witness.1 

1.  The  offense  in  the  proclamation  that  the  divine  counsel 
concerning  humanity  was  fulfilled  in  a  crucified  one  finds  its 
solution  only  in  the  conviction  of  faith  that  suffering  and  death 
not  only  did  not  encroach  in  a  disturbing  manner  in  the  Savior- 
dignity  and  work  of  Jesus,  but  is  of  fundamental  and  per- 
manent importance  for  our  salvation. 

Note  to  §93 

1.  Bibliography  on  the  atonement:     Strauss's  Glaubenslehre ;  Lip- 
sius :  Dogmatik;  Biedermann :  Dogmatik;  histories  of  doctrine  by 
Harnack,  Fisher  and  Shedd;  Kaftan's  Dogmatik;  Wernle's  Begin- 
nings of  Christianity;  J.  Caird's  Fundamental  Ideas  of  Christianity; 
Bowne:  The  Atonement;  Sabatier:    The  Atonement;  E.  von  Hart- 
mann's  Selbstversetzung  des  Christentums ;  tbe  recent  volume  of  es- 
says by  several  authors,  under  the  title,  '*  The  Atonement." 

2.  It  is  this  conviction  that  church  doctrine  seeks  theolog- 
ically to  establish,  since  it  deduces  the  necessity  of  the  suffer- 
ing and  death  of  Christ  from  God's  nature  in  its  relation  to 
sin,  and  accordingly  expounds   (a)    the  necessity  of  a  penal 
satisfaction,  (b)  the  sole  possible  modus  of  a  satisfactio  vicaria 
by  the  God-man,  (c)  the  actuality  of  this  satisfaction  in  Jesus 
Christ's  obedieniia  passiva  et  activa,  and  (d)  the  effects  of  this 
satisfaction  for  us.1 

Note  to  §93 :  2 

1.  Note  the  historical  inevitableness  of  the  death  of  Jesus,  and  its 
teleological  necessity  in  religion. 

Paulsen  observed  the  Oberammergau  play  for  thirteen  hours,  and 
then  went  home  to  his  library  and  wrote  to  Die  Christliche  Welt 
that  the  experience  confirmed  what  he  had  long  believed  on  other 
grounds,  that  the  death  of  the  Man  of  Galilee  on  the  cross  was  the 
most  valuable  asset  in  human  history.  In  what  does  its  importance 
consist?  How  can  values  be  got  out  of  it  for  to-day?  Nothing  in 
history  is  valuable  for  us  that  is  not  capable  of  being  transmuted  into 
personal  life.  A  modern  theologian  has  said,  "  So  far  as  the  religious 
value  of  the  death  of  Jesus  is  concerned,  it  might  as  well  have  been 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     173 

by  pneumonia."  But  if  it  had  been,  would  he  have  been  the  founder 
of  a  new  religion? 

Who  died  on  the  cross,  according  to  Paul?  Not  the  man  Jesus,  but 
the  "  Heavenly  Being,"  the  Messiah.  After  you  have  stripped  off  all 
the  Messianic  predicates,  is  the  death  of  the  man  Jesus  such  as  makes 
for  the  salvation  of  men  ?  It  was  the  death  of  a  peasant,  a  man  who 
had  wanted  to  revolutionize  theology  perhaps,  but  who  did  not  want 
to  die  and  had  no  thought  of  saving  men  by  his  death.  Is  there  a  re- 
duction of  values,  pari  passu,  as  the  Messianic  predicates  are  reduced  ? 
Is  not  the  human  more  than  the  Messianic  ?  Perhaps  the  peasant  of 
Galilee  has  "  more  to  him  "  than  the  God-man  had.  If  we  can  say  so, 
there  is  a  way  out  of  our  difficulty.  Is  not  the  essentially  and  ideally 
human  the  divinest  thing  we  know  anything  about? 

(We  are  saved  by  doubt  as  well  as  by  faith;  by  struggle  and  be- 
wilderment as  well  as  by  ease  and  peace  and  certainty.) 

3.  A  systematic  evaluation  must  recognize  the  deep  ethico- 
religious  content  of  ecclesiastical  doctrine  which  seeks  to  bring 
to  validity  the  grievousness  of  human  sin  as  a  contradiction  to 
God's  moral  world-order,  as  well  as  to  the  greatness  of  the  di- 
vine love.  This  church  doctrine  also  rightly  finds  the  signifi- 
cance of  Jesus  as  our  Representative  in  his  suffering  and  death, 
but  there  are  decisive  objections  to  the  mode  and  manner  in 
which  the  Church  has  evaluated  these  thoughts  and  against  the 
form  which  they  have  assumed,  (a)  As  to  (a)  above  (the 
necessity  of  a  penal  satisfaction),  objection  must  be  urged 
against  the  idea  that  God's  love  is  in  tension  with  his  righteous- 
ness and  is  to  be  restricted  to  the  condition  of  penal  satisfac- 
tion.1 (b)  As  to  (b)  above  (vicarious  satisfaction),  objection 
must  be  urged  against  the  idea  that  God's  righteousness  is  to 
be  satisfied  by  the  transference  of  guilt  and  punishment  to  the 
guiltless.2  (c)  As  to  (c)  above,  objection  must  be  urged 
against  the  idea  that  Jesus  Christ  in  his  holy  suffering  and 
death  is  to  be  considered  as  object  of  divine  penal  judgment 
and  the  bearer  of  the  divine  wrath  and  curse.8  (d)  As  to 
(d)  above,  objection  must  be  urged  against  the  idea  that  the 
ecclesiastical  doctrine  has  told  us  how  and  under  what  objective 
conditions  the  remissio  peccati  and  imputatio  justiliae  is  possible 
to  God.  That  doctrine  has  not  made  clear,  moreover,  how  the 
Crucified  One  himself  makes  us  inwardly  certain  of  the  for- 
giveness of  guilt  and  free  from  tbe  power  of  sin.4  6 


174      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Notes  to  §93 :  3 

1.  If  what  is  true  jof  the  Father  is  true  of  the  Son,  why  should  the 
Father  have  a  monopoly  of  wrath,  and  why  should  not  the  reparation 
be  made  to  the  Son  as  well  as  to  the  Father  ?     The  Second  Person  of 
the  Trinity  dies  that  the  First  Person  of  the  Trinity  may  forgive. 
There  must  be  penal  satisfaction  to  God  by  God  antecedent  to  divine 
forgiveness.     This  ecclesiastical  form  of  the  doctrine  has  become  im- 
possible.    But  is  there  no  truth  in  it?     The  old  theory  was  that  a 
part  of  God  suffered  to  appease  another  part  of  God.     This  idea  of  the 
divine  suffering  needs  to  be  widened  to  include  all  deity.     Forgiveness 
without  suffering  is  immoral,  and  God  is  the  great  sufferer  in  this 
universe.     In  commenting  on  the  statement  of  Dr.  Strong,  that  if 
sin  lasts  forever,  God  suffers  forever,  certain  editors  remarked,  "  We 
thought  it  was  the  sinner  that  suffered  forever."     They  had  better 
think  again.     God  is  not  a  wooden  God.     We  must  interpret  him 
according  to  the  highest  human  analogy.     But  the  suffering  of  God  is 
not  a  menace  to  the  divine  blessedness ;  rather  is  it  a  condition  of  that 
blessedness. 

2.  See  W.  N.  Clarke's  Theology. 

3.  If  God  was  with  Jesus  at  any  time,  it  must  have  been  when  Jesus 
•was  suffering  on  the  cross.     The  momentary  obscuration  of  the  con- 
sciousness of  Jesus  is  easily  explicable  psychologically.     A  God  who 
would  forsake  Jesus  on  the  cross  is  not  the  Christian  God  at  all. 

4.  The  dissolution  of  the  ecclesiastical  doctrine  of  the  atonement. 
The  Church-doctrine  set  forth  the  objective  annulment  of  that 

which  separates  sinful  humanity  from  communion  with  God.  There- 
fore it  set  forth  also  the  objective  reconciliation  of  humanity  with 
God  as  the  personal  priestly  work  of  Christ,  i.  e.  as  the  personal  effect 
of  that  which  he  as  God-man  did  and  suffered  by  way  of  vicarious 
satisfaction  for  humanity.  Now  the  inner  contradiction  in  this  doc- 
trine is  seen  by  elucidating  the  question  (a)  as  to  the  subject  and 
object  of  the  vicarious  satisfaction,  (b)  as  to  the  mode,  and  (c)  as  to 
the  effect. 

a.  The  question  as  to  the  subject  and  object  of  the  vicarious  satis- 
faction. What  was  it  in  the  God-man  that  vicariously  satisfied  and 
for  what  was  the  satisfaction?  The  Protestant  Church  doctrine  an- 
swered as  follows:  The  God-man,  through  everything  which  he  did 
and  suffered  in  the  unity  of  the  two  natures,  made  vicarious  satisfac- 
tion, i.  e.  with  his  perfect  fulfilment  of  the  law  for  the  deficiency  of 
sinful  humanity,  or  his  active  obedience,  and  with  his  innocent  suf- 
fering for  their  guilt,  or  his  passive  obedience. 

But  now  as  to  his  active  obedience,  the  following  is  the  criticism 
made  by  Socinians,  Arminians,  rationalists,  anti-Trinitarians,  the 
Protestant  speculative  movement,  Kant,  et  al.  Even  if  this  obedience 
was  sufficient  in  and  of  itself  before  God,  yet  it  cannot  be  designated 
as  vicarious  for  us,  because  the  requirement  of  obedience  for  us  exists 
after  as  well  as  before  satisfaction  was  made  for  humanity.  (Accord- 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     175 

ing  to  Kant  our  obligation  is  all  the  greater  for  that  obedience,  if  it 
makes  any  difference  at  all,  for  it  shows  the  possibility  of  perfect 
obedience.)  The  active  obedience  of  Christ,  therefore,  was  not  sub- 
stitutionary, but  typical,  exemplary  and  obligating  us  to  imitation. 
It  is  not  vicarious  for  us;  it  cannot  take  the  place  of  our  obedience. 

As  to  the  suffering  of  Christ  as  substitutionary  satisfaction  for  the 
guilt  of  humanity,  (1)  the  physical  suffering  and  dying  of  Christ  as 
substitutionary  satisfaction  in  place  of  our  own  suffering  and  death 
is  not  to  be  thought  of.  That  suffering  was  such  as  belongs  to  earthly 
human  nature,  but  in  the  case  of  Jesus  it  was  only  the  personally 
guiltless  result  of  the  sin  of  the  rest  of  humanity.  But  even  this  is 
not  an  instance  of  vicarious  suffering,  because  as  a  fact  it  has  not 
vicariously  abolished  even  for  believers,  that  for  which  alone  it  could 
be  vicarious,  viz.  the  physical  evil  of  sin  and  the  natural  death  of 
humanity.  The  passive  obedience  of  Christ  is  not  vicarious  for  us, 
as  physical,  for  even  the  leaders  in  the  early  Christian  Church  suf- 
fered these  evils. 

(2)  The  moral  act  of  voluntary  surrender,  on  account  of  love,  to 
suffering  and  death  (which  alone  remains  of  that  satisfaction)  is 
not  gained  substitutionally.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  transferability,  but 
of  imitability.  There  is  nothing  more  intimate  and  unshared  than 
the  moral  worth  which  accrues  to  personality.  It  cannot  be  disen- 
gaged from  one  person  and  transferred  to  another. 

Therefore,  having  disposed  of  the  active  and  the  passive  obedience 
of  Christ  in  this  way,  all  that  remained  which  could  pass  as  substitu- 
tionary was  Christ's  eternal  death.  But  (1)  the  God-man  did  not 
suffer  eternal  death.  His  endurance  of  the  punishments  of  hell  could 
be  only  a  moral  sympathy,  not  an  active  endurance  of  the  sufferings  of 
the  lost.  Moreover,  (2)  the  future  punishments  of  sin  as  a  matter  of 
fact  were  not  objectively  vicariously  cancelled  by  Christ's  hypothetical 
death.  Proof  of  this  is  the  continuous  seriousness  of  the  menace  of 
such  punishments  to  the  consciousness  of  every  man. 

b.  The  question  as  to  the  mode  of  the  vicarious  satisfaction.  How 
is  the  action  and  passion  of  Christ  to  be  conceived  vicariously,  sub- 
stitutionally? The  Church  doctrine,  which  from  its  point  of  view 
consistently  defined  the  sacrifice  of  the  God-man  as  the  objective  solu- 
tion of  a  transcendent  conflict  between  righteousness  and  love,  in 
reality  (1)  contradicted  righteousness  as  well  as  love  and  therewith 
the  absoluteness  of  God  in  general;  (2)  externalizes  the  relation 
of  man  to  his  guilt  and  also  to  his  God.  The  transference  (not 
annulment)  of  the  Old  Testament  conception  of  sacrifice  is  the  tell- 
ing proof  that  the  whole  form  in  which  the  doctrine  is  drawn  out 
has  its  roots  in  soil  of  law-religion,  and  not  of  morality-religion.  It 
is  a  regress  on  the  part  of  the  Christian  religion  back  to  legalism, 
back  to  Judaism,  and  so  it  stands  in  an  inner  principiant  contradic- 
tion to  the  specifically  Christian  problem  of  atonement,  which  sought, 
but  did  not  find,  its  solution  in  law-religion. 


176     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

c.  The  question  as  to  the  effect  of  that  vicarious  satisfaction.  Here 
the  critical  understanding  presented  these  alternatives:  Either  (1) 
if  the  work  of  Christ  is  really  a  substitutionary  satisfaction,  human- 
ity is  precisely  as  a  matter  of  fact  freed  thereby  from  all  that  for 
which  it  was  made,  or  (2)  if  this  is  not  the  case  (and  it  is  said  not 
to  be  the  case  on  all  sides,  said  by  the  church-doctrine  itself,  in  its 
doctrine  of  faith),  then  that  action  and  passion  of  Christ  were  not 
objectively,  substitutionally  satisfaction. 

Criticism  on  the  basis  of  the  historico-critical  study  of  the  life  of 
Christ.  (1)  In  Jesus'  own  thought  of  his  death  there  is  an  entire 
absence  of  the  doctrine  that  that  death  had  an  objective  reference 
Godward,  on  account  of  which  alone  God  would  forgive  sin.  Wit- 
ness, for  example,  the  parable  of  the  prodigal  son,  where  the  condi- 
tion of  divine  forgiveness  is  solely  human  repentance.  Witness, 
further,  the  preaching  of  Jesus  concerning  repentance,  in  which  there 
is  entire  absence  of  the  thought  of  substitutionary  satisfaction.  (2) 
The  voluntariness  of  the  death  of  Christ  as  set  forth  in  the  church- 
doctrine  is  not  supported  by  the  facts  of  the  record  of  the  life  of 
Christ.  That  he  voluntarily  came  from  heaven  to  earth  to  die  on  the 
cross  does  not  seem  to  have  been  an  item  of  his  consciousness.  That 
he  expected  to  be  crucified  from  the  beginning  of  his  life  or  even  of 
his  public  ministry  is  not  a  matter  of  certainty.  The  certainty  seems 
to  have  been  limited  to  the  last  days  of  his  life  only,  and  the  synoptic 
narrative  points  rather  to  his  hope  that  he  may  escape  the  fate 
of  the  cross,  to  unwillingness  to  die,  than  to  any  consciousness  of  a 
foreordained  fate  by  virtue  of  which  the  wrath  of  God  should  be 
appeased.  Nevertheless  this  position  does  not  mean  that  his  death 
as  a  fact  did  not  have  the  value  which  all  suffering  and  martyrdom 
of  the  righteous  have,  as  the  supreme  and  indispensable  agency  in 
overcoming  the  sin  of  the  individual  and  of  the  race.  The  Pauline- 
conception  of  the  indispensableness  of  the  death  of  Christ  can  be  vin- 
dicated by  an  appeal  to  reason  and  to  experience. 

5.  This  is  subsumption  of  the  death  of  Jesus  under  a  category  with 
which  all  are  familiar.  It  is  the  suffering  and  death  of  the  martyr, 
the  suffering  of  the  innocent  on  account  of  the  sins  of  the  guilty  that 
saves  society.  Note  the  worth  for  science  of  the  martyr-death  of 
Bruno.  Four  hundred  years  after  his  death,  a  monument  was  erected 
where  he  was  burnt.  His  death  more  than  his  life  made  science  pos- 
sible. And  if  the  sight  of  the  toiling  and  suffering  of  the  righteous 
for  the  sins  of  the  guilty  will  not  save,  nothing  will. 

Can  we  predicate  of  God  himself  the  redemptive  suffering  which 
Paul  predicated  of  the  heavenly  Being?  We  must,  or  we  lose  some- 
thing of  the  best  that  history  has  to  give  us.  The  category  of  the 
heavenly  Being,  or  the  Messiah,  is  not  of  the  modern  world,  but  the 
values  it  contained  are  eternal  values.  Our  task  is  to  substitute  for 
the  mythological  vessel  the  vessel  of  immanence  and  to  preserve 
the  eternal  gospel  in  the  forms  of  our  time.  We  have  to  find  as  im- 


SCJPERSTEUCTUKE  OF  CHKISTIAN  DOGMATICS      17? 

manent  and  constant  that  value  and  efficiency  and  purpose,  that  grace 
and  love,  which  Paul  found  in  one  great  episode  only.  God  is  always 
speaking,  or  he  has  never  spoken  at  all.  This  does  not  mean  that  he 
spoke  always  with  the  same  emphasis.  He  may  have  spoken  with 
epoch-making  definiteness  in  the  life  and  death  of  Jesus.  But  with 
the  change  to  the  modern  world-view,  we  can  keep  the  myth  of  Mes- 
sianism  only  by  moral  insincerity,  and  we  are  not  in  a  universe  in 
which  one  can  be  saved  by  moral  insincerity. 

In  our  doctrine  of  the  atonement  we  must  seek  to  give  systematic 
formulation  to  "  the  deep  and  eternal  truth  hidden  in  the  faith  in  the 
vicarious  suffering  of  the  righteous  and  the  infinite  worth  of  martyr- 
dom" (Bousset).  There  are  two  interests  to  be  satisfied  in  our  doc- 
trine of  the  meaning  of  the  death  of  Jesus :  first,  can  the  modern  man 
assent  to  it?  and  second,  can  the  religious  man  be  satisfied  with  it? 
Systematic  theology  must  satisfy  the  scientific  demand  for  reality 
and  the  religious  demand.  If  this  cannot  be  done,  if  we  are  obliged 
to  say  that  what  the  intellect  says  is  true  the  heart  says  is  not  good 
and  not  satisfying,  and  that  when  the  heart  judges,  this  is  good,  the 
intellect  says,  yes,  but  it  is  not  true,  then  the  only  thing  to  do  would 
seem  to  be  to  do  as  the  "  darkey  "  said  he  would  do,  in  the  old  story 
—  take  to  the  woods ! 

§94.  Jesus'  Suffering  and  Death  as  the  Culmination  of  a  Hu- 
man Life  Well-Pleasing  to  God  and  Vicarious  for  Us. 

1.  Jesus'   suffering  and   death  reposes  in   accord  with  the 
philosophy  of  a  divine  immanence,  on  the  being  and  work  of 
God  in  him.     But  this  is  by  no  means  mere  passivity  of  Jesus, 
but  personal  deed. 

2.  The  following  propositions  of  faith  with  reference  to  the 
suffering  and  death  of  Jesus  may  be  formulated,     (a)   Jesus' 
suffering  and  death  in  its  relation  to  God  is  the  definitive  con- 
firmation and  exemplification  of  his  faith  and  of  his  obedience 
in  the  performance  of  the  work  which  his  Father  gave  him  to 
do.     (a)  Jesus'  faith  was  led  into  the  most  grievous  conflict 
in  connection  with  his  sufferings,  for  it  was  precisely  in  his 
suffering  that  his  outer  experience  entered  into  sharpest  con- 
tradiction with  the  inner  certitude  of  his  person  and  work, 
so  far  as  he  himself  stood  there  forsaken  by  God's  help  and 
so  far  as  even  his  Savior-work  seemed  to  be  not  only  thwarted 
through  human  sin  but  even  converted  into  its  opposite,  viz. 
into  a  heaping  up  of  sin  and  judgment  for  humanity.     More- 
over, under  these  outer  circumstances  the  experience  or  feel- 


178      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ing  of  the  gracious  presence  of  God  was  repressed  in  his  con- 
sciousness. But  his  faith  was  consummated  in  this  conflict, 
since  he  held  fast  to  God  even  when  appearances  and  even 
when  his  own  feelings  were  against  him.  This  judgment  of 
faith  is  not  refuted  but  confirmed  by  the  words  of  his  prayer 
from  the  twenty-second  Psalm,  (ft)  In  the  struggle  of  faith 
Jesus'  obedience  led  to  the  uttermost  conflict  between  God's 
will  and  the  tendency  of  the  human,  natural  will,  and  with  this 
to  the  severest  temptation.  But  Jesus  overcame,  in  full  resig- 
nation to  the  counsel  of  God  concerning  his  personality  and 
concerning  humanity,  (b)  Jesus'  suffering  and  death  in  rela- 
tion to  man  is  the  consummation  of  his  Savior-love.  This  love 
finds  its  special  expression  in  the  fact  that  Jesus,  suffering  and 
dying,  participates  in  all  man's  burdens,  (a)  Jesus  bears  sin, 
not  indeed  in  the  sense  that  he  took  their  guilt  upon  himself 
and  felt  himself  as  jointly  guilty,  but  in  the  sense  that  he  felt 
in  holy  sympathy  the  guilt  and  power  of  sin  resting  upon  them, 
and  the  judgment  in  its  whole  severity  that  threatened  them. 
(/?)  Equally  so,  Jesus  endured  punishment,1  not  indeed  in  the 
sense  that  his  suffering  had  the  character  of  discipline  or  even 
of  judicial  punishment  for  his  own  self,  but  in  the  sense  that 
he,  the  guiltless  one,  was  affected  in  a  special  degree  by  that 
suffering  which  was  ordained  on  account  of  sin,  and  in  part  di- 
rectly caused  by  sin. 
Note  to  §94 : 2 

1.  In  Isaiah  53  we  have  a  profound  and  beautiful  conception  of 
suffering,  under  which  the  death  of  Jesus  can  be  brought  by  way  of 
explanation  and  interpretation.  It  is  truer,  to  Jesus  than  to  some 
ideal  Israel  or  Messiah.  Jesus  was  wounded  for  transgressions  not 
his  own. 

3.  Precisely  in  the  crucified  Jesus  there  was  (a)   the  con- 
summation of  the  true  religio-ethical  destiny  of  man,  in  his 
inner  glory,  in  opposition  to  the  Judaic  and  Hellenic  views, 
yet  not  in  the  sense  of  asceticism;  and  (b)  at  the  same  time 
the  perfect  worth  ("merit")   of  Jesus  in  the  sight  of  God. 
His  death  was  the  offering  supremely  well-pleasing  to  God  and 
truly  spiritual,  and  at  the  same  time  the  acme  of  priestly  serv- 
ice, through  which  Jesus  purposes  to  lead  us  to  God. 

4.  In  all  these  relations  the  suffering  and  dying  Jesus  is 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     179 

precedent  and  model  for  us.  Above  all  the  Crucified  One  is 
our  Representative  before  God  (v.  §91:2).  This  thought  is 
involved  in  the  idea  of  his  offering  and  priesthood ;  in  our  sins 
we  do  not  satisfy  the  holy  will  of  God,  but  Jesus'  holy  suffering 
and  death  perfectly  satisfies  that  will,  guarantees  that  not 
frivolity  or  levity,  but  earnest  repentance  and  zeal  for  holiness 
shall  awaken  in  those  who  believe  in  Jesus  as  the  Crucified. 
Therefore  God's  holy  will  is  not  abridged,  does  not  fall  short, 
but  is  rather  truly  fulfilled.  This  positive  satisfaction  on  the 
part  of  the  Crucified  is  to  be  distinguished  from  the  negative 
penal  satisfaction  of  the  church  doctrine.  This  positive  satis- 
faction also  can  comfort  our  fearful  consciences  before  God, 
can  appeal  also  to  the  Crucified  as  ethically  effective  warranty 
in  our  fear  before  God's  holiness.  The  idea  of  propitiation, 
expiation,  atonement,  having  so  many  meanings,  may  be  em- 
ployed only  in  the  sense  of  a  personally  and  ethically  effective 
merit  of  Christ,  a  merit  not  really  but  only  legally  effective,  or 
effective  as  cult  in  the  church  doctrine. 

§95.  Jesus'  Suffering  and  Death  as  Consummation  of  the  Di- 
vine Work  of  Grace. 

1.  A  second  series  of  propositions  of  faith  belongs  here  side 
by  side  with  the  first,  mentioned  in  §94.     This  second  series 
expresses  the  faith  that  precisely  in  the  crucifixion  of  Jesus 
Christ,  God's  holy  love  reveals  itself  and  proclaims   (a)   the 
redeeming  power  of  that  love,  and  (b)  its  educative  wisdom. 

2.  The  crucifixion  is  direct  actualization  of  the  holy  love  of 
God  toward  sinful  humanity  in  the  following  four  particulars: 
(a)  It  is  actualized  as  love  which  forgives  guilt,1  so  that  here 
first  faith  in  forgiveness  receives  (a)   its  strongest  proof  and 
verification,  and  (/8)  its  full  depth,     (b)   It  actualizes  itself  as 
a  holy,  earnest  love,  so  that  it  is  able  to  awaken  in  us  along 
with  faith  in  forgiveness  the  full  consciousness  of  guilt  and 
honest  pain  over  sin  at  the  same  time,     (a)  Yet  it  is  at  the 
cross  of  Christ,  especially  in  Jesus'  bearing  of  sin,  that  the  fear- 
ful mystery  of  sin,  with  its  contradiction  or  antagonism  to  God, 
is  first  fully  manifest.      (j8)   But  at  the  same  time  the  whole 
seriousness  of  sin  is  made  impressive  to  us  through  the  great- 
ness of  the  divine  love,  which,  in  Paul's  phrase,  "  spared  not 


180     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

his  own  Son."  (c)  It  is  actualized  as  sanctifying  love  (love 
that  ethicizes),  so  that  it  is  able  to  break  the  power  of  sin.  For 
whoever  surrenders  himself  in  real  personal  trust  to  the  Cruci- 
fied, for  him  is  (a)  negatively,  the  valuation  of  the  world  and 
of  its  goods  and  glory,  as  a  chief  good,  destroyed,  and  an  ab- 
horrence of  sin  implanted;  but  also  (/8)  the  positive  inner  obli- 
gation and  power  to  a  life  in  the  service  of  the  Crucified  and 
of  those  for  whom  he  died,  (d)  It  is  actualized  as  love  that 
overcomes  the  world,  suffering  and  death,  so  that  it  is  able  to 
lead  us  to  surrender  to  God's  will  and  thus  lead  us  also  to  free- 
dom from  the  world.2  For  (a)  the  world-order  of  suffering 
and  death,  under  which  Jesus  bowed,  impresses  us  as  an  order 
of  the  holy  and  gracious  will  of  God.  (/8)  And  also  that  which 
seems  completely  counter  to  the  will  of  God  discloses  itself  as 
subject,  however,  to  God's  love  and  wisdom. 

Notes  to  §95 :  2 

1.  It  is  only  guilt  that  is  forgivable.     Sin  is  to  be  overcome  and 
healed. 

2.  Obedience  to  God  is  liberation  from  the  world. 

3.  The  effects  just  mentioned  (under  2  above),  proceeding 
from  the  Crucified,  accord  full  right  to  our  faith  in  Jesus  as 
our  Representative  and  Surety,  but  they  are  all  combined  in 
the  faith  that  "  God  was  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world  unto 
himself." 

§96.  A  Comprehensive  Expression  of  the  Redemptive  Worth 
of  the  Suffering  and  Death  of  Christ. 

1.  The  question,  Why  must  Jesus  suffer  and  die?  found  its 
answer  in  §§94  and  95.     There  it  was  shown  how  far  a  cruci- 
fied Savior  was  necessary  to  sinful  humanity. 

2.  In  Biblical  expression  the  saving  worth  of  the  suffering 
and  death  of  Christ  for  the  individual  and  for  humanity  may 
be  expressed  in  the  proposition  that  it  was  necessary,  in  order 
to  the  consummation  of  the  reconciliation  and  redemption  of 
men,  and  to  the  establishment  of  the  new  covenant.     With  ref- 
erence to  these  Biblical  expressions,  the  idea  of  reconciliation, 
having  special  reference  to  the  guilty  separation  of  man  from 
God,  signifies  the  divinely-effected  peace  with  sinful  humanity, 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     181 

a  peace,  however,  to  be  accepted  (appropriated)  by  the  indi- 
vidual; and  the  idea  of  redemption  signifies  liberation  from 
sin  and  the  world,  liberation  which  is  complete,  brought  to  us 
through  Christ,  yet  to  be  eternally  consummated ;  and  the  idea 
of  the  covenant  signifies  the  establishment  of  a  relation  of  per- 
fect mutual  fellowship  between  God  and  humanity  —  a  fellow- 
ship originating  from  God  and  actualized  through  the  death  of 
Christ. 

3.  As  a  more  historico-philosophical  treatment,  the  suffering 
and  death  of  Jesus  Christ  presents  itself  as  necessary  in  order 
to  the  abrogation,  the  inner  overcoming  and  surpassing,  of  the 
Old  Testament  with  its  legal  order ;  but  also  to  the  unification 
of  the  religiously  sundered  humanity  into  one  communion.1 

Note  to  §96 :  3 

1.  Would  it  be  possible  under  the  true  impression  of  the  cross  of 
Jesus,  for  Christendom  to  split  asunder  as  it  is  to-day  ? 

4.  The  interior  attitude  that  the  evangelical  Christian  and 
the  evangelical  community  have  to  occupy  to  the  Crucified  is 
to  be  derived  from  the  importance  and  significance  of  the  death 
of  Jesus  Christ.     That  attitude  is  one  of  penitent  faith  in  the 
conquering  holy  love  of  God.     Also  for  the  Christian  and  for 
Christianity  the  Crucified  One  abides  ever  as  the  Living  One.1  a 

Notes  to  §96 :  4 

1.  "  I  am  he  that  liveth  and  was  dead,  and  behold  I  am  alive  for- 
evermore."     Whatever  be  the  form  of  immortality  it  cannot  be  pos- 
sible in  a  rational  and  moral  universe  that  the  content  which  makes 
up  the  true  Jesus  should  go  to  naught. 

2.  Is  salvation  an  end  which  can  be  attained  only  by  the  death  of 
Jesus  as  means? 

I  fear  that  sometimes  the  negative  answer  involves  too  superficial 
a  conception  of  the  significance  of  what  it  is  to  die  as  Jesus  died. 
"  If  it  die,  it  bringeth  forth  much  fruit."  The  costliness  of  an  ideal, 
the  price  in  agony  that  any  of  our  ideals  has  cost  the  race,  is  fearful. 
Those  ideals  are  borne  by  persons,  and  it  is  a  fact  that  the  history  of 
Christian  experience  corroborates  the  statement  that  in  one  way  or 
another  those  who  bear  the  ideals  fall  victims  to  th^  vulgar  reality 
about  them.  It  looks  as  if  their  tragedy  of  life  belonged  to  the  very 
world-order.  The  bearer  of  the  ideal  falls  into  the  ground  and  dies, 
but  in  and  through  this  perishing  bearer  of  the  ideal,  the  ideal  moves 
on  apace.  The  perishing  of  the  bearers  is  an  indispensable  condition 


182     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

of  the  triumph  and  fruition,  of  the  further  development  and  power,  of 
the  ideals  themselves. 

Bruno  is  an  illustration  of  this.  He  was  a  bearer  of  the  ideal  of 
voraciousness,  courage  and  freedom  in  science.  It  was  the  lower  ideal 
which  put  him  to  death.  The  science  that  already  was  burnt  him, 
the  bearer  of  this  higher  kind  of  science.  It  was  the  good  putting 
the  better  to  death.  Bruno  died  that  later  scientists  might  live  and 
have  freedom.  They  enjoy  freedom,  because  chains  were  put  upon 
him.  On  his  three  hundredth  death-day,  February  the  17th,  1902, 
a  monument  was  unveiled  on  the  very  spot  where  he  met  his  fate. 

And  what  put  Jesus  to  death  ?  If  you  know  a  finer  example  of  the 
general  principle  of  the  bearer  of  an  ideal  dying  that  the  ideal  might 
be  accomplished  than  Jesus,  where  is  it  ?  Christian  martyrs  may  have 
given  their  bodies  to  be  burned,  and  yet  they  have  not  had  love  in  the 
same  measure  as  Jesus  had.  Yet  truly  Christian  martyrs  fill  up  the 
measure  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ. 

Does  the  death  of  Jesus  have  cosmic  significance?  How  pro- 
foundly into  history  and  even  into  nature  does  the  principle  of  altru- 
ism reach?  Is  altruism  cosmic?  Does  the  triumph  of  the  ideal  ac- 
cording to  the  principle  of  dying  to  live  show  itself  to  be  a  basic  and 
inviolable  world-order?  Does  the  death  of  Jesus  come  under  this 
universal  category?  Is  it  true  that  there  is  purpose  in  everything,  or 
else  purpose  in  nothing  at  all?  Or  that  if  God  is  not  immanent  in 
nature  and  in  history,  there  is  no  God  at  all?  But  if  God  is  imma- 
nent and  there  is  purpose  in  everything,  what  must  be  the  degree  of 
significance  in  such  an  event  as  the  death  of  Jesus  ? 

It  is  not  meant  that  we  can  exempt  all  things  in  our  lives  from  the 
category  of  capricious  irrationality.  But  I  am  only  a  fugitive 
thought,  an  episode  in  the  universe.  If  I  could  see  all  from  the  view- 
point of  the  center,  this  item  which  is  so  difficult  for  intellect,  feel- 
ing and  conscience  might  be  seen  to  be  of  great  value.  There  seems 
no  impossibility  in  the  dying  of  Jesus  being  among  the  culminating 
values  of  the  whole  cosmic  movement.  It  is  a  question  to  be  de- 
termined by  religio-philosophical  considerations  ultimately.  We 
should  recognize  that  the  intelligibility  of  the  death  of  Jesus  for  us 
depends  on  our  ability  to  get  some  general  category  under  which  to 
subsume  it.  If  not,  it  is  at  most  mere  dumb,  meaningless  fact.  We 
must  look  for  something  in  experience  like  it. 

I  believe  that  the  death  of  Jesus  and  all  events  of  that  kind  have 
real  cosmic  significance.  That  death  is  an  expression  of  what  is  in 
the  cosmic  process  from  the  beginning.  Note  the  costliness  of  our 
values.  Even  the  stones  in  these  university  buildings  were  built  up 
through  the  death  of  countless  micro-organisms.  Through  science 
we  are  beginning  to  see  what  things  have  cost.  There  always  have 
been  others  dying  that  we  might  live.  And  we  can  say  that  in  all 
our  Western  civilization  no  institution  has  been  built  up,  nor  home 
established,  nor  child  born,  nor  ship  sailing  the  sea,  nor  nail  driven, 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     183 

that  would  not  have  been  different,  if  Jesus  had  not  lived  and  been 
crucified. 

But  why,  it  may  be  asked,  should  we  single  Jesus  out  in  this  way? 
In  the  first  place,  the  facts  of  history  seem  to  justify  it.  In  the  sec- 
ond place,  it  belongs  psychologically  to  the  nature  of  mind  to  take 
great  historic  exemplars  and  give  them  a  symbolic  significance. 
Ideals  are  personalized  of  necessity.  Socrates  and  Bruno  are  other 
illustrations  of  this,  and  Abraham  Lincoln,  already  idealized  and 
mythicized  into  a  symbol  of  American  ideal  manhood.  It  depends,  to 
be  sure,  on  historic  circumstances  to  some  extent  whether  one  is  se- 
lected or  not.  It  is  the  wave  that  is  at  the  right  angle  to  catch  the 
sun  of  history  that  is  lit  up  and  forever  glorified.  Yet  it  is  not  meant 
that  it  is  accidental,  a  thing  of  mere  mechanism.  [The  value  must 
be  there,]  and  we  have  been  able  to  take  Jesus  in  religion  as  the  su- 
preme illustration  of  the  law  which  gives  us  the  stones  of  the  uni- 
versity buildings,  and  our  daily  bread. 

The  peculiar  error  of  the  orthodox  doctrine  of  the  redemptive  neces- 
sity of  the  death  of  Christ,  an  error  through  which  it  falls  into  con- 
tradiction with  essential  Christianity,  is  this,  viz.  that  it  ignores  the 
fact  that  love  and  holiness  inwardly  and  organically  belong  together, 
and  function  together  in  God.  Love  does  nothing  in  which  holiness 
does  not  participate,  and  vice  versa.  And  this  error  of  orthodoxy  is 
not  a  merely  theoretical  error;  it  is  a  practical  and  injurious  mis- 
take. For  an  idea  of  salvation  attaches  itself  thereto  which  ignores 
the  fact  that  salvation  in  its  inner  character  is  an  ethically  determined 
salvation.  The  orthodox  proposition  of  the  righteousness  of  God  re- 
quiring satisfaction  before  his  love  can  pardon  contradicts  the  Chris- 
tian knowledge  of  God.  It  is  true  that  the  orthodox  thought  of 
righteousness  is  more  in  accord  with  the  Christian  knowledge  of  God 
than  the  Socinian  doctrine  of  God's  arbitrary  power  on  the  one  hand 
and  levity  on  the  other.  But  it  is  also  certain  that  the  Christian 
thought  of  holy  love,  of  the  inner  belonging  together  of  love  and  holi- 
ness, is  better  than  the  orthodox  thought  of  righteousness,  with  its 
legalistic  interpretation. 

When  we  seek  to  understand  the  necessity  of  the  death  of  Jesus  to 
the  Christian  salvation,  we  do  not  expect  a  merely  historical  treat- 
ment to  yield  the  desired  result.  Historical  science  at  best  can  only 
show  that  an  event  was  historically  unavoidable  under  given  cir- 
cumstances. But  the  knowledge  needed  is  not  of  the  historical  inevit- 
ability of  the  death  of  Jesus,  but  of  its  teleological  necessity.  And  it 
is  not  enough  to  say  that  it  was  a  means  to  an  end ;  we  must  see  that  it 
was  necessary  as  means  to  human  salvation  as  end.  This  means  that 
the  end  can  not  be  attained  by  any  other  means.  The  end  is  an 
eternal  end,  the  redemption  and  blessedness  of  man.  But  this  end  is 
to  be  attained  in  history,  and  the  means  to  this  end  must  be  in  history, 
so  the  question  conies  to  be,  May  a  thing  historically  unavoidable  at 
#ie  same  time  of  necessity  serve  an  end  ?  Identification  of  the  end  in- 


184     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

volves  religious  evaluation  and  lies  in  the  realm  of  dogmatics,  but  the 
historical  unavoidability  of  the  occurrence  and  its  necessity  as  means 
to  a  definite  end  do  not  lie  in  entirely  different  regions,  since  both  are 
in  history. 

Now  it  is  an  historical  law  that  in  many  turning  points  in  history 
precisely  the  same  circumstances  which  unavoidably  usher  in  an  event 
make  that  event  also  a  necessity,  i.  e.  indispensable  means  in  order  to 
the  actualization  of  a  definite  end.  For  example,  the  breach  with  the 
hierarchical  world-church  at  the  Reformation  was  the  necessary  means 
for  the  existence  of  evangelical  Christianity,  because  the  hierarchy 
would  have  choked  —  would  have  had  to  choke  —  the  faith  that  was 
immediately  related  to  the  grace  of  God.  But  the  right  of  the  breach 
to  exist  consists  in  the  fact  that  evangelical  salvation  was  not  to  be 
had  without  its  mediation.  And  how  did  it  come  about  that  this 
breach,  which  was  not  originally  intended  or  expected,  became  his- 
torically unavoidable?  By  the  hierarchy  and  the  free  evangelical 
faith  being  mutually  exclusive  principles.  Therefore  the  same  cir- 
cumstances which  unavoidably  led  to  that  breach  became  necessary 
as  means  to  the  actualization  of  evangelical  Christianity.  Accord- 
ing to  this  same  historical  law  the  necessity  of  the  death  of  Christ 
as  redemptive  means  is  to  be  understood  on  the  basis  of  its  historical 
unavoidability.  There  are  then  three  stages  in  our  constructive  task, 
viz.  (A)  to  set  forth  the  historical  connection  whose  necessary  result 
was  the  death  of  Christ;  (B)  to  understand  that  this  connection  was 
nothing  other  than  the  necessary  product  of  the  antecedent  history  of 
revelation;  (C)  to  reach  finally  the  universal  historical  factors  which 
participated  therein,  viz.  the  holy  love  of  God  on  the  one  side  and  the 
sins  of  man  on  the  other. 

(A).  We  must  first  set  forth  the  historical  inevitableness  of  the 
death  of  Christ.  In  human  history  the  holy  love  of  God  became  per- 
sonal in  a  special  degree  in  Jesus  Christ.  That  holy  love  in  Jesus 
exerted  a  dynamic  influence  upon  man,  and  it  was  unavoidably  di- 
rected toward  the  sins  of  men.  Now  the  party  of  the  Pharisees,  dom- 
inant in  Israel,  confronted  Jesus.  It  was  the  Pharisees  that  killed 
Jesus.  The  Sadducees  were  only  instrumental  in  the  hands  of  the 
Pharisees.  The  Sadducees  were  the  elite  men  of  the  world,  too  far 
removed  from  Jesus  to  join  in  any  personal  conflict  with  him.  At 
the  other  extreme  publicans  and  sinners  received  Jesus  with  joy,  and 
on  their  own  account  would  not  have  organized  a  movement  against 
him.  Now  it  was  only  in  relation  to  the  Pharisees  —  pious  people 
who  awaited  Israel's  salvation  —  that  the  condition  was  fulfilled  under 
which  a  mortal  conflict  arose.  They  shared  the  same  fundamental 
view,  but  within  that  fundamental  view  there  was  a  principiant  oppo- 
sition between  them.  Jesus  proclaimed  the  Kingdom  of  God  as  at 
hand.  He  awaited  its  appearing.  With  his  disciples  he  gave  himself 
to  the  life  and  endeavor  after  righteousness  —  the  righteousness  of 
the  kingdom.  But  so  did  the  Pharisees.  They  too  were  anxious  to 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     185 

plan  and  nurture  righteousness  in  the  people,  as  they  understood  it. 
But  while  Jesus  proclaimed  and  confirmed  the  love  of  God  which  in 
the  death  of  the  natural  man  would  create  a  new  man  unto  eternal 
life,  the  Pharisees  were  bent  on  a  fulfilment  of  the  divine  promises  in 
a  way  that  corresponded  to  the  natural  heart,  i.  e.  they  were  bent  on 
the  satisfaction  not  of  the  lusts  of  the  flesh,  but  of  ambition,  power, 
national  pride;  in  short,  of  the  most  characteristic  impulses  of  the 
morally  cultivated  man  of  the  world.  Again,  in  the  case  of  Jesus 
there  was  a  supramundane  Kingdom,  developed  primarily  as  a  king- 
dom of  moral  righteousness  in  the  world ;  in  the  case  of  the  Pharisees 
a  supernatural  world-kingdom  in  this  world.  Again,  in  the  case  of 
Jesus  there  was  a  righteousness  of  disposition  that  accredits  itself 
and  exemplifies  itself  in  self-denial  and  love;  but  in  the  case  of  the 
Pharisees,  righteousness  in  the  observance  of  religious  precepts,  with 
which  one  can  parade  before  men.  Thus  the  opposition  was  as  wide 
as  it  could  be  within  the  same  category.  Hence  of  necessity  the 
conflict  between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisees  arose,  since  both  parties 
claimed  the  people  and  since  both  claimed  to  offer  the  people  God's 
truth  and  God's  salvation.  A  reconciliation  was  impossible.  Jesus 
could  not  forego  the  fulfilment  of  his  vocation.  It  had  been  given 
him  by  the  Father,  and  it  was  his  own  meat  and  drink.  He  could 
not  change  his  ideas  of  God  and  man,  of  righteousness  and  redemp- 
tion. But  the  Pharisees  could  not  change  either.  Publicans  and 
sinners  change  when  God's  truth  touches  their  hearts,  but  those  who 
unite  the  worldly  mind  indissolubly  with  faith  in  God  do  not  change. 
Those  do  not  change  who  are  convinced  that  they  carry  on  God's 
cause  with  their  worldly  disposition,  impulses  and  deeds.  There  is 
no  conversion  or  repentance  possible  for  those  who  are  really  thus 
convinced.  Therefore  the  conflict  was  historically  unavoidable. 
Here,  if  anywhere,  was  historical  necessity.  But  in  the  world  it  is 
always  the  children  of  the  world  who  win  the  first  victory.  They 
employ  means  against  which  the  holy  one  of  God  is  powerless,  just 
because  he  is  the  holy  one  of  God.  And  so  the  conflict  between  the 
Pharisees  and  Jesus  came  to  the  bloody  end  to  which  it  had  to  come. 

(B).  It  is  clear  that  more  universal  factors  come  into  play  here. 
The  death  of  Jesus  did  not  take  place  under  accidental  circumstances 
which  might  have  been  avoided  in  the  development  of  the  history  of 
revelation,  but  that  death  took  place  of  necessity  in  the  connection 
of  this  development,  and  this  position  is  clear  from  the  following 
considerations :  — 

(a)  The  soil  in  which  the  event  has  its  roots  was  the  people  of 
Israel,  made  ready  for  that  event  by  the  Old  Testament  revelation; 
and  in  its  characteristic  feature,  viz.  as  murder  of  the  Messiah,  the 
event  was  possible  only  on  this  Judaic  soil.  If  now  we  compare  what 
Jesus  preached  and  what  his  foes  advocated,  we  see  that  both  positions 
have  their  point  of  contact  with  the  Old  Testament.  The  deepest 
thoughts  of  the  old  covenant  attain  fulfilment  through  Jesus.  On 


186     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

the  other  hand,  the  Pharisees  support  themselves  on  the  shell  of  the 
old  covenant,  on  what  was  provisional  and  transitory  in  it.  The  con- 
flict between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisees  is  nothing  but  the  conflict  be- 
tween the  kernel  and  the  husk  of  the  old  covenant,  the  same  conflict 
in  which  the  prophets  had  fought  and  suffered  and  died.  The  death 
of  Jesus  is  the  conflict  in  which  the  transitory,  worldly  side  of  the 
old  covenant  apparently  overcame  and  demolished  its  eternal  kernel. 
In  reality  the  shell  of  the  old  covenant  was  thereby  burst,  so  that  now 
the  blessings  of  Abraham  could  come  to  all  the  people.  Jesus,  the 
servant  of  Jehovah,  in  his  death  fulfilled  the  vocation  of  Israel  to 
bear  as  God's  prophet  God's  life  and  righteousness  to  all  people.  His 
death,  therefore,  is  the  necessary  transition  from  the  old  covenant  to 
the  new  covenant.  The  New  Testament  renders  the  necessity  of  the 
death  of  Jesus  intelligible  by  articulating  it  in  this  connection  with 
the  history  of  revelation  (See  Galatians  3 : 13,  14). 

(b)  The  death  of  Jesus  is  therefore  the  necessary  catastrophe  of 
the  divine  revelation.     The  sins  of  men,  their  carnal  mind,  carried 
this  with  it,  viz.  that  the  kingdom  of  God  could  be  introduced  into 
history  only  in  the  form  of  a  natural  folk-state.     Again,  the  sins  of 
men  carried  with  them  that  men  should  ever  cling  to  the  shell  instead 
of  penetrating  to  the  kernel,  and  that  they  should  do  this  also  in  a 
decisive  moment,  viz.  in  the  fulness  of  time,  and  so  it  came  about, 
as  come  about  it  had  to,  that  the  bearer  of  the  perfect  revelation  of 
God  was  nailed  to  the  cross  by  those  who  were  called  to  be  representa- 
tives of  the  preparatory  revelation  of  God.     The  better  became  the 
bitter  foe  of  the  best. 

(c)  A  look  into  the  inner,  spiritual  side  of  the  sufferings  of  Jesus 
is  possible  in  this  connection.     The  sensible  pain  needs  no  explana- 
tion.    That  is  immediately  intelligible  to  every  man  (but  that  also 
is  not  to  be  made  little  of).     In  the  climax  that  pain  brought  with 
it  the  most  grievous  inner  suffering  of  momentary  God-forsakenness. 
That  pain  is  never  to  be  isolated,  for  it  occurred  under  circumstances 
which  gave  rise  to  spiritual  sting  as  well.     But  the  spiritual  suffer- 
ings need  further  explanation.     If  we  try  to  gain  an  understanding 
of  these,  we  must  set  out  from  the  analogy  of  our  own  experience. 
The  thing  which  gives  the  keenest  sting  to  all  human  suffering  is 
the  guilt-feeling.     There  springs  from  the  guilt-feeling,  a  foretaste 
of  what  the  Scriptures  mean  by  "  eternal  death,"  "  spiritual  death." 
But  we  dare  not  use  this  analogy  regarding  the  sufferings  of  Jesus. 
He  had  no  guilt-feeling,  since  he  knew  no  sin ;  and  moreover  a  trans- 
ference of  the  guilt-feeling,  as  guilt-feeling,  is  impossible.     In  an- 
other manner  Jesus  did  bear  the  sin  and  guilt  of  man  as  soul-torture. 
What  was  that  other  manner?     We  must  find  another  human  analogy 
to  which  we  can  fasten  on,  if  we  are  to  understand  the  spiritual 
sufferings  of  Jesus;  and  to  this  end  we  must  take  account  of  the 
fact  that  it  was  the  purpose  and  end  of  Jesus'  personal  life  to  work 
,ou.t  and  carry  through  God's  holy  wilj  of  love  in  a  world  of  sin. 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     187 

But  through  the  contradiction  of  sinners  he  had  continuously  to 
fight  with  the  imminent  frustration  of  this  his  life's  end  and  pur- 
pose. He  had  to  fight  this  frustration  in  his  foes,  in  his  kindred, 
even  in  his  disciples.  There  are  few  human  experiences  that  can 
equal  this  in  bitterness.  Add  to  it  the  peculiarity  of  the  vocation 
of  Jesus,  which  consisted  in  revealing  and  actualizing  the  holy 
love  of  God  in  the  world.  Since  this  love  was  precisely  for  sinners 
whose  hostility  Jesus  had  to  experience,  this  contradiction  was  at  the 
same  time  a  continuous  disillusioning  of  his  love  —  of  love  to  men 
and  especially  to  his  people,  to  gather  and  save  whom  was  the  burden 
of  his  heart;  and  this  again  is  the  source  of  the  bitterest  spiritual 
suffering.  The  greater  the  love,  the  deeper  this  kind  of  suffering; 
deepest  of  all  here  then  where  love  was  the  greatest.  His  death 
signifies  the  climax  of  his  suffering.  He  suffered  death  from  the 
hands  of  his  people;  was  left  by  his  disciples  as  an  outcast  alone 
with  God,  and,  in  his  imagination,  momentarily,  was  left  by  God 
himself  in  his  uttermost  agony. 

(d)  The  death  of  Jesus  then  results  of  necessity  in  the  order  of 
the  historical  revelation.  What  necessarily  brought  it  about  was  the 
carnal  mind  of  Israel,  the  sins  of  the  people  and  of  their  leaders.  But 
the  question  now  is,  Why  did  God  choose  this  people  and  no  other 
to  prepare  the  way  for  the  perfect  revelation  ?  A  sufficient  answer  to 
that  question  is  that  it  would  have  been  the  same,  had  he  chosen, 
any  other  people.  Israel  was  representative  of  sinful  humanity,  and 
it  was  the  antagonism  in  humanity  in  general  to  the  holy  love  of 
God  that  led  to  this  result  in  Israel.  On  the  causal  side,  therefore, 
the  death  of  the  Mediator  was  the  necessary  result  of  the  revelation 
of  the  holy  love  of  God  in  sinful  humanity.  The  only  way  that 
death  could  have  been  avoided  would  have  been  for  God's  love  to 
cease  to  be  holy,  in  which  case  it  would  not  have  antagonized  sinners ; 
or  for  sinners  to  have  ceased  to  be  sinful,  in  which  case  they  would 
not  have  antagonized  the  holiness  of  love.  But  both  hypotheses  are 
impossible.  Therefore  the  death  of  the  Savior  was  the  necessary 
means  for  the  actualization  of  that  salvation  which  is  grounded  in 
the  eternal  redemptive  purpose  of  God  himself. 

(C)  Let  us  now  take  up  the  third  of  the  three  problems.  Hitherto 
we  have  thought  of  causal  connection.  The  death  of  the  Savior  was 
the  necessary  result  of  the  revelation  of  the  holy  love  of  God  in  sin- 
ful humanity.  But  now  it  is  precisely  out  of  this  fact  that  we 
gain  the  knowledge  of  its  teleological  necessity  as  the  sole  sufficient 
means  for  God's  end.  Recall  the  significance  of  the  illustration  of 
the  breach  at  the  Reformation.  Precisely  the  same  circumstances 
which  usher  in  an  event  make  that  event  the  necessary  means  to 
the  end  that  is  to  be  actualized.  So  it  is  in  the  case  in  question. 
The  death  of  the  Savior  is  the  necessary  means  to  the  actualization 
of  the  Christian  salvation  among  men.  (Salvation  is  the  inner 
ethicization  of  the  personal  and  social  life  which  leads  to  filial  com- 


188      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

munion  with  God  and  brotherly  fellowship  with  men.)  The  knowl- 
edge of  the  holy  love  of  God  has  developed  by  virtue  of  him  and  his 
death.  Through  him  men  have  been  led  by  this  love,  which  is  both 
holy  and  forgiving.  But  in  this  connection  the  resurrection  of 
Jesus  Christ  from  the  dead  must  be  taken  into  account.  It  was  in 
connection  with  the  resurrection,  however  that  event  be  conceived 
more  closely,  that  the  death  of  Christ  won  its  historical  importance 
for  the  church  and  its  faith.  This  enlargement  of  the  problem  is 
required  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  then.  This  factor  is  not  taken 
into  account  in  the  historical  causal  explanation.  There  the  point 
was  as  to  the  death  of  Christ  as  the  necessary  result  of  the  historical 
development,  but  in  the  case  of  the  dogmatic  teleological  elucidation, 
this  complement  cannot  be  dispensed  with,  for  we  are  concerned  with 
the  death  of  Christ  as  deed  of  God,  necessary  to  our  salvation;  but 
this  deed  of  God  is  the  death  of  Christ  only  as  taken  in  connection 
with  his  resurrection  from  the  dead.  The  necessity  of  the  death  of 
Christ  thus  supplemented  as  means  of  redemption  has  attested  itself  in 
the  macrocosm  of  human  history  by  the  fact  that  the  Christian 
church  was  called  into  life  thereby.  Moreover,  the  narrower  circle 
of  the  disciples  of  Jesus  was  thereby  first  brought  to  faith,  to  right 
knowledge  and  to  right  life.  The  sin  of  humanity  did  its  uttermost, 
its  worst,  when  it  nailed  the  Mediator  of  the  holy  love  of  God  to 
the  cross.  Now  follows  the  back-stroke,  the  knowledge  of  sin,  re- 
pentance, faith  and  life  in  God  —  in  the  living  God  who  has  revealed 
his  innermost  being  in  this  deed  of  saving  love.  We  may  not  think 
lightly  of  this  matter,  since  it  signifies  nothing  less  than  that  there 
would  have  been  no  Christianity  in  the  world  without  it.  But  the 
same  thing  attests  itself  in  the  microcosm  of  the  individual  life  of 
man,  and  in  this  way,  viz.  the  preaching  of  the  cross  of  Christ  is  seen 
to  be  the  necessary,  the  sole  sufficient  means  to  awaken  that  faith 
which  leads  to  salvation.  It  is  the  business  of  the  doctrine  of  con- 
version, of  regeneration,  to  set  that  forth.  The  Christian  attains  to 
the  certainty  of  reconciliation  when  in  the  death  of  Christ  he  becomes 
aware  of  the  holy  love  of  God  which  at  once  judges  and  forgives. 

Finally  there  remains  the  question  as  to  the  necessity  of  the  re- 
demptive death  of  Christ,  not  for  the  human  macrocosm  or  microcosm, 
but  for  God.  The  orthodox  satisfaction-theory  affirms  this.  It  is  its 
merit  to  have  done  so,  and  the  test  of  any  theory  on  this  great  sub- 
ject is  its  ability  to  make  good  this  Godward  necessity  of  the  death 
of  Christ 

The  death  of  Christ  was  necessary  for  God,  on  the  supposition  that 
he  meant  to  save  sinners.  But  this  necessity  to  God  must  be  under- 
stood otherwise  than  was  the  case  with  the  old  church  doctrine.  The 
fundamental  thought  in  both  is  the  same,  for  the  orthodox  doctrine 
also  thinks  of  God  as  the  real  and  ultimate  subject  or  agent  of  the 
redemptive  endeavor.  God  himself  effects  the  divine-human  atone- 
ment through  which  his  righteousness  is  satisfied.  If  now  we  remove 


SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  DOGMATICS     189 

everything  mythological,  and  if  we  substitute  for  the  notion  of  a 
conflict  between  divine  righteousness  and  mercy,  as  set  forth  in  the 
orthodox  theory,  the  thought  of  a  unitary  divine  energy  which  pro- 
ceeds from  love  and  is  conditioned  in  the  mode  of  its  activity  by 
righteousness,  then  the  general  thought  of  the  old  doctrine  is  the 
same,  viz.  that  in  God  there  exists  an  inner  necessitation  to  actualize 
salvation  thus  and  not  otherwise.  But  this  does  not  destroy  the 
difference  between  the  two  positions,  the  old  doctrine  and  the  new 
thought.  According  to  the  orthodox  doctrine  the  necessitation  for 
God  signifies  that  satisfaction  must  be  done  to  his  righteousness 
prior  to  his  forgiveness.  But  our  point  is  this,  viz.  that  the  necessi- 
tation of  the  death  of  Christ  consists  in  the  fact  that  the  holy  God 
could  not  reveal  himself  among  sinners  in  a  way  that  would  not  in- 
volve this  issue  and  such  issues  as  this,  and  that  sinners  could  not  be 
overcome  and  brought  to  the  faith  apart  from  such  a  revelation  of 
the  holy  God.  The  point  common  to  the  two  expositions  is  the 
thought  of  a  necessitation  immanent  in  the  holy  nature  of  God.  The 
difference  between  the  two  positions  is  that,  according  to  the  modern 
thought,  the  necessity  of  the  means  to  the  end  is  not  to  be  found  in 
a  divine  exigency,  but  in  the  moral  constitution  of  man.  The  value 
of  this  change  from  the  old  to  the  new  consists  in  deepening  the 
doctrine  of  the  atonement  from  the  juristic  to  the  ethical.  If  the 
juristic  apprehension  of  the  doctrine  of  the  atonement  is  to  be  re- 
placed by  an  ethical  apprehension,  it  is  indispensable  that  instead  of 
the  legal  order  of  the  state,  the  moral  order  of  education  shall  under- 
lie our  understanding  of  the  death  of  Christ.  The  death  of  Christ 
was  not  necessary  as  punishment,  but  only  as  means  of  education. 
The  death  of  the  Savior  was  the  sole  sufficient  means  to  the  end  of 
man's  highest  education,  and  this  end  is  grounded  in  the  nature  of  the 
Educator,  i.  e.  in  God  himself.  For  then  all  appearance  of  arbi- 
trariness and  of  selection,  which  at  first  seems  to  cleave  to  the  con- 
ception of  means  of  education,  vanishes,  and  it  becomes  clear  that 
the  necessity  is  a  necessity  for  God.  It  is  here  that  the  bottom 
necessity  of  the  death  of  Christ  is  disclosed.  Any  attempt  at  a 
change  of  conception  that  does  not  go  as  deep  as  this,  so  far  as  it 
holds  to  the  old  legal  presuppositions  is  exposed  to  the  danger  of 
lagging  behind  the  moral  earnestness  of  the  old  doctrine,  instead  of 
ethically  deepening  it. 

[The  anticipated  third  main  division  of  "  The  Superstructure  of 
Dogmatics,"  viz.  "God  and  the  Holy  Spirit"  (see  §42:2),  does  not 
appear  here  under  that  head.  However,  much  of  the  material  which 
would  have  been  introduced  in  that  connection  will  be  found  in  the 
following  treatise  on  "  The  Ethics  of  the  Christian  Religion."] 


SECOND  TEEATISE 
THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION 

(A  SYSTEMATIC  DISCUSSION  OF  THE  PRINCIPLES 
AND  CONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN 
MORAL  IDEAL  AND  OF  THE  WAY  IN  WHICH  IT 
IS  ROOTED  IN  THE  RELIGIOUS  FAITH  OF  THE 
CHRISTIAN.)  i 

§97.  Introduction:  The  Task  of  Christian  Ethics  in  Relation 
to  the  Task  of  Christian  Dogmatics. 

1.  Through  faith  in  Jesus  as  the  Revealer  of  God  we  are 
conscious  not  only  of  an  invisible  spiritual  reality  which  ac- 
tually exists  and  which  determines  our  life,  but  also  of  a  self- 
actualizing  formation  of  the  human  personal  and  social  life 
which  the  Christian  judges  to  be  the  content  of  the  will  of 
God  for  us.  On  the  one  hand  is  the  Christian  consciousness 
of  an  invisible  spiritual  reality  to  which  we  accord  actual  exist- 
ence, and  on  the  other  hand  is  our  social  personal  life  in  which 
we  are  engaged  in  self-effectuation.  This  we  judge  to  be  the 
content  of  the  will  of  God.  What  then  is  the  task  of  ethics, 
and  what  of  dogmatics,  and  how  are  they  related  ?  Dogmatics 
studies  the  spiritual  being.  Ethics  studies  the  life.  Since 
Christ  has  finished  his  work  this  goal  is  in  process  of  actualiza- 
tion wherever  faith  in  him  exists.  But  it  is  more  especially 
an  ideal  in  consciousness  to  whose  fulfilment  as  members  of  the 
believing  Christian  community  we  are  obligated  and  capaci- 
tated. In  other  words,  this  goal  is  the  ethical  task.  Christian 
dogmatics  has  as  its  subject-matter,  or  object,  thaf  spiritual 
reality  which  is  certain  to  the  believer,  but  Christian  ethics, 
or  theological  ethics,  has  as  its  subject-matter,  or  object,  this 
ideal  which  is  to  be  actualized  by  the  believer.2  The  positivist 
studies  the  latter  as  wholly  disengaged  from  the  former.  Chris- 

190 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION     191 

tian  ethics  is,  as  opposed  to  that,  specifically  religimis  ethics, 
i.  e.  the  moral  life- conditioned  by  religious  faith.3 

Note  to  Christian  Ethics 

1.  Bibliography:     Volumes  entitled   Christian  Ethics  by  Wuttke, 
Martensen,  Dorner,  T.  B.  Strong,  and  Newman  Smyth;  Herrmann's 
Faith  and  Morals;  Wundt's  Ethics,  the  chapter  on  the  history  of 
Christian  Ethics;  Paulsen's  Ethics;  Martineau's   Types  of  Ethical 
^Theory;  Gass:  Geschichte  der  Ethik;  Herrmann:  Ethik;  Calixtus: 
Christliche    Ethik;    H.    Schultz:    Evangelische    Ethik;    Pfleiderer: 
Sittenlehre  and  Religion  und  Moral;  Jacobi:  Neue  Testamentliche 
Ethik;  Dobschiitz's  works  on  the  Apostolic  Age;  Harnack:  The  Ex- 
pansion of  Christianity  During  the  First  Three  Centuries;  Lecky's 
History    of    European    Morals;    Jodl:    Geschichte    der    christlichen 
Moral;  Lillie's  Principles  of  Protestantism-. 

Notes  to  §97 : 1 

2.  Christian  dogmatics  and  Christian  ethics  treat  the  same  inner 
process  of  the  human  spirit  and  of  the  historical  life,  only  one  from 
the  standpoint  of  the  efficiency  of  God,  the  other  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  self-activity  of  the  human  spirit. 

3.  It  was  first  through  Schleiermacher  that  the  essential  connections 
and  equal  justification  of  the  two  disciplines  (dogmatics  and  ethics) 
were  brought  to  validity,  and  their  separate  treatment  became  current. 

2.  In  the  Protestant  knowledge  of  the  importance  of  faith, 
the  conditions  both  of  an  evangelical  dogmatics  and  also  of  an 
independent  evangelical  ethics  are  already  given.     The  scien- 
tific problem  for  us  is  this :     How  can  an  ethics  which  is  reli- 
giously conditioned  be  autonomous?     Philosophy  requires  that 
ethics  shall  be  autonomous.     Right  here  lies  the  most  impor- 
tant criticism  of  Christian  ethics.     Is  Christian  ethics  heterono- 
mous  (its  ideal  supplied  by  the  will  of  another)  or  autonomous 
(its  ideal  imposed  by  the  self)  ?     A  third  characterization  is 
theonomous  (the  ideal  emerging  from  God  and  his  will).     Does 
Christian  ethics  involve  theonomy,  heteronomy  or  autonomy  ? 

3.  In  particular  the  tasks  of  Christian  ethics  are  to  be  de- 
fined as  follows:     (a)  As  principle  it  has  to  make  clear  the 
meaning  and  the  basis  of  the  Christian  ideal  from  the  point  of 
view  of  its  connection  with  Christian  faith,      (b)   In  particular 
the  task  of  Christian  ethics  is  to  exhibit  the  content  of  the 
Christian  ideal,  therefore  the  individual   and  the  social  life 
required  by  that  ideal.     It  has  to  bring  out  the  main  principles 


192      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

of  that  life  and  keep  aloof  from  casuistic  treatment  and  special 
considerations  of  technique.  These  points  (a  and  b)  may  be 
briefly  expressed  thus:  to  study  the  basis  and  the  content  of 
the  Christian  ideal.  It  grounds  its  conviction  of  the  attain- 
ability of  the  ideal  in  the  dynamic  which  faith  supplies. 

4.  With  these  two  tasks  (a  and  b  above)  we  move  wholly 
within  the  Christian  faith;  but  for  all  that  we  must  look  be- 
yond the  pale  of  Christianity  in  the  theological  treatment  of 
ethics;  for  the  ideal  of  the  Christian  moral  life  confronts  us 
as  one  of  the  human  moral  ideals.  In  our  faith,  our  Christian 
value-judgment,  we  are  convinced  that  the  Christian  ideal  is 
the  culmination  of  the  moral  life  of  humanity,  and  that  there- 
fore this  ideal  is  characterized  by  universal  validity.  Yet  we 
must  seek  to  establish  this  claim  to  universal  validity,  and  in 
doing  so  we  touch  the  region  in  which  philosophical  ethics 
moves. 

§98.  The  Relation  of  Christian  Ethics  to  Philosophical  Ethics, 
and  the  Task  of  Grounding ',  or  Establishing,  Christian 
Ethics. 

1.  We  are  confronted  with  difficulties  when  we  attempt  to 
define  more  accurately  the  reciprocal  relation  of  theological  and 
philosophical  ethics.     The  presuppositions  of  faith  from  which 
Christian  ethics,  as  a  member  of  theological  science,  sets  out, 
may  be  easily  exhibited.     But  the  difficulty  is  that  the  task 
of  philosophical  ethics  is  so  variously  conceived. 

2.  In  one  series  of  the  great  philosophical  systems  philosoph- 
ical ethics  itself  appears  as  the  promulgator  of  an  ideal  of  life 
with  a  definite  content.     This  ideal  ever  according  to  times  and 
peoples  and  also  according  to  the  personality  of  the  philosopher, 
is  very  variously  shaped.     Even  according  as  this  life-ideal  is 
opposite  to  the  Christian,  or  allied  with  the  Christian,  or  essen- 
tially identical  with  the  Christian,  such  philosophical  ethics  has 
boon  either  rejected  or  sifted  by  Christian  ethics,  or  else  has 
been  greeted  as  an  ally. 

3.  But  philosophical   ethics  does  not  have  as  its  essential 
task  this  exhibition  of  the  content  of  an  ethical  ideal.     On  the 
contrary  the  following  scientific  task  belongs  to  philosophical 
ethics,  viz.:     (a)  By  means  of  psychological  analysis  philo- 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  CHRISTIAN  RELIGION     193 

sophical  ethics  makes  clear  two  main  ideas  of  the  moral  life, 
and  with  this,  two  distinguishing  characteristics  of  the  moral 
over  against  other  sides  of  the  human  life,  such  as  the  aesthetic, 
the  logical,  and  the  religious,  (b)  By  means  of  critical  inves- 
tigation philosophical  ethics  makes  clear  the  validity  of  these 
formal  moral  ideas,  and  the  grounds  on  which  that  validity 
rests,  and  with  this  seeks  criteria  at  the  same  time  for  the 
critical  comparison  of  moral  ideals  as  to  their  content.  (This 
is  the  real  task  of  philosophical  ethics.)  (c)  By  means  of 
historico-philosophical  survey  philosophical  ethics  exhibits  the 
factors  which  co-operate  in  the  historical  development  of  the 
moral  ideal,  and  the  stages  which  emerge  in  connection  with 
that  development. 

4.  In  all  three  of  these  directions  the  work  of  philosophical 
ethics  is  important  for  Christian  ethics  also,  and  it  is  advisable 
to  use  that  work.  This  is  especially  true  in  the  first  main  divi- 
sion of  our  task,  viz.  the  Foundation  of  Christian  Ethics,  which 
has  to  borrow  a  series  of  propositions  from  philosophical  ethics.1 
In  the  foundation  of  Christian  ethics  we  have  to  investigate 
(a)  the  peculiarity  of  the  moral  life  in  general  which  is  espe- 
cially disclosed  in  Christianity,  and  (b)  the  truth  of  the  lead- 
ing moral  ideas  which  form  the  content  of  the  Christian  ideal, 
and  the  right  of  the  claim  it  puts  forward  to  universal  validity. 

Note  to  §98 :4 

1.  The  peculiarity  of  Christian  ethics  is  that  it  considers  morals  in 
connection  with  religion,  or  ethical  life  as  founded  in  faith.  It  sets 
forth  ethical  requirements  as  grounded  in  the  will  of  God,  a  claim 
which  philosophical  ethics  would  not  make. 


PAET  I.     THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN 
ETHICS 

A.    THE   PECULIARITY    OF    THE    MORAL   LIFE 

§99.  The  Conception  of  the  Moral  Law. 

1.  To  determine  the  peculiarity  of  the  moral  life  as  against 
other  sides  of  the  life  of  the  human  spirit  (such  as  the  aesthetic 
and  the  religious),  we  may  not  confine  ourselves  to  the  rudest, 
most  undeveloped  forms  of  the  moral  life,  but  must  make  the 
higher  forms  of  the  moral  the  object  of  analysis.1 

Note  to  §99 : 1 

1.  There  is  a  weakness  and  one-sidedness  common  to  evolutionistic 
interpretations.     They  seek  to  understand  the  more  developed  stages 
by  an  examination  of  the  genesis  alone.     But  "a   thing  is  what  it  is, 
not  what  it  came  from."     If  one  had  to  determine  the  peculiarity  of 
the  human  as  against  animal  life,  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  confine 
the  comparison  to  the  embryologically  human  on  the  one  side  and  the 
animal  on  the  other.     It  is  hard  to  distinguish  the  human  from  the 
animal  in  the  embryological  stage.     We  must  take  man  in  the  fruition 
of  his  moral  development,  not  in  the  embryonic  stage  of  his  moral 
history.     We  cannot  determine  the  essence  of  religion  if  we  take  no 
account  of  Christianity;  in  its  embryological  form  religion  was  a 
very  selfish  thing  indeed.     Nor  is  the  case  of  morality  essentially 
different.     See  Miinsterberg :  Ursprung  der  Sittlichkeit. 

2.  As  characteristic  of  this  whole  moral  region  we  are  con- 
fronted with  the  formal  thought  that  I  ought  to  do  this  or  that, 
that  this  or  that  is  morally  required.     Now  the  content  of  this 
"  ought "  is  very  diverse  indeed,  but  the  form  is  wherever  the 
moral  is  found.     Yet  we  can  make  clear  to  ourselves  what  we 
mean  when  we  say  "  I  ought,"  or,  in  other  words,  when  we 
employ  the  concept  "  moral  law." 

3.  "  I  ought  to  do  something  "  appears  in  consciousness  very 
differently  from  "  I  may,"  i.  e.  very  differently  from  the  de- 
termination of  the  will  through  the  natural  impulses  and  in- 
clinations.    The  distinction  is  this,  that  we  are  conscious  in 

194 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      195 

the  case  of  the  u  I  ought  "  of  a  uniform  rule  for  similar  cases 
of  conduct.  This  distinction  is  clearest  where  the  morally 
required  and  the  agreeable  are  contradictory  as  to  content.  It 
is  not  wanting  entirely,  however,  where  desire  and  requirement 
agree  as  to  content. 

4.  A  moral  commandment  is  to  be  sharply  distinguished  from 
rules  of  sagacity  or  of  utility,     (a)   The  latter  also  come  under 
the  category  of  rules  of  conduct  indeed,  and  of  such  rules  as  are 
formed  on  the  basis  of  experience  at  that,      (b)  Also  on  that 
basis  of  experience  and  on  account  of  their  partial  agreement 
in  content  as  well  they  are  frequently  confounded  with  moral 
requirements,     (c)   But  a  rule  of  conduct  receives  its  distin- 
guishing character  of  a  moral  commandment  as  follows:     (a) 
We  ascribe  to  it  unconditioned  validity,  while  a  rule  of  sagacity 
has  only  hypothetical  validity.     (/8)   We  employ  it  as  criterion 
not  merely  for  the  content,  but  also  for  the  interior  form,  or 
the  motivation,  of  conduct,      (y)   We  even  make  the  worth  of 
the  personality  itself  dependent  upon  its  inner  agreement  or 
non-agreement  with  the  moral  law.1 

Note  to  §99 : 4 

1.  The  value  of  personality  is  not  determined  ultimately  by  its 
artistic  or  religious  content  or  form,  but  by  the  moral  criterion.  The 
moral  is  the  criterion  of  religion,  even. 

5.  Similarly,  sharp  distinction  is  to  be  made  between  moral 
requirement  and  civil  requirement,     (a)   The  requirement  of 
civil  law  and  of  the  moral  are  formally  similar  in  this,  that 
obligation  attaches  to  both  in  a  wide  scope.     They  coincide  in 
wide  scope.     The  two  are  not  clearly  differentiated  in  all  the 
elementary  stages  of  human  life,  and  they  are  often  confounded 
in  the  present,      (b)  But  the  distinction  between  the  two  may 
be  seen  from  the  following  questions:     (a)   Upon  what  does 
the  validity  in  each  case  rest?     In  the  case  of  the  state,  upon 
external  power  and  authority,  which  makes  and  executes  the 
law.     But  in  the  case  of  morality  the  validity  rests  upon  inner 
grounds.1      (/8)   What  is  the  result  of  the  non-fulfilment  of  the 
civil  and  of  the  moral  law  ?     In  the  case  of  the  civil,  the  result 
is  outer  punishment.     In  the  case  of  the  moral  the  result  is 
inner   umvorthiness    and    inner   self-depreciation.     (Herewith 


196      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

the  result  is  also  many  times  even  physical  evil  to  the  com- 
munity or  to  posterity.)  2  (y)  To  what  is  rule  or  norm  given 
in  each  case?  To  what  does  civil  law  give  norm?  To  the 
outer  relation  of  man.  The  moral  gives  rule,  or  norm,  to  this 
also,  but  primarily  and  fundamentally  to  the  disposition.3 

Notes  to  §99 :  5 

1.  Suppose  the  ethics  of  Jesus  were  actualized  universally.     Would 
the  state  be  superseded  ? 

2.  Might  there  be  an  inner  fulfilment  of  the  moral  law,  and  yet 
physical  evil  result  to  the  community  or  to  posterity?     One  of  the 
great  paradoxes  on  which  religious  faith  lives  is  that  moral  good  some- 
times results  in  physical  evil. 

3.  The  ethics  of  Jesus  is  disposition-ethics,  intention-ethics. 

6.  What  is  the  relation  of  the  moral  requirements  to  those 
of  social  customs?     What  is  the  difference  between  the  moral 
and  the  conventional?     (a)   There  is  a  formal  similarity,  and 
to  a  certain  degree  also  a  coincidence  of  content,     (b)   There- 
fore the  moral  and  the  customary  were  not  discriminated  orig- 
inally, and  are  frequently  not  discriminated  even  to-day,      (c) 
But  there  is  an  essential  distinction  between  the  two.     (a) 
The  rules  of  good  custom  rest  upon  the  outer  authority  of  public 
opinion.1     (/8)   The  rules  of  good  custom  threaten  the  trans- 
gressor with  social  disesteem  and  its  consequences,      (y)   The 
rules  of  good  custom  regulate  only  the  outer  forms  of  human 
relations.     The  moral,  as  against  this,  rests  upon  inner  author- 
ity, has  as  penalty  inner  disesteem  and  pain,   and  seeks  to 
regulate  the  inner  disposition. 

Note  to  §99 :  6 

1.  Public  opinion  is  the  most  powerful  force,  next  to  truth;  for 
the  latter  one  will  lay  down  his  life. 

7.  In  view  of  what  has  been  set  forth  in  3  to  6,  and  espe- 
cially in  4,  what  stamps  as  a  moral  requirement  any  rule  of  our 
volition  and  conduct  which  has  a  definite  content?     In  other 
words,  what  is  it  that  clothes  the  rule  with  the  character  of 
"ought"?1     Our  acknowledging  the  rule  (a)  as  uncondition- 
ally valid,  i.  e.  our  exalting  it  above  considerations  of  inclina- 
tion, of  utility,  and  of  external  authority ;  (b)  as  norm  for  the 
inner  form  of  our  will,  i.  e.  its  having  to  do  with  motive  and 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      197 

intention;  and  (c)  as  criterion  for  the  worth  of  the  whole  per- 
son.2 

Notes  to  §99 :  7 

1.  We  constantly  subtract  rules  that  cease  to  have  the  "  oughtness," 
and  add  new  ones  that  have  taken  on  that  "  oughtness." 

2.  To-day  we  ask  whether  the  game  of  gaining  great  personal  wealth 
is  worth  playing,  and  whether  it  is  being  played  according  to  rule, 
or  not.     Is  "  what  a  man  is  worth  "  a  criterion  of  the  real  worth  of 
the  whole  man  ? 

Is  it  right  to  regulate  life  by  a  rule  purporting  to  be  moral  which  is 
not  actually  moral  ?  For  example,  is  "  Sabbath-keeping  "  a  criterion 
for  determining  the  worth  of  the  person  ? 

§100.  The  Essence  of  the  Moral  Judgment  in  Relation  to  the 
Other  Value- Judgments. 

1.  Moral  requirements  of  the  kind  designated  above  deter- 
mine the  moral  judgment.     It  is  according  to  the  standard  of 
these  requirements  that  we  evaluate  our  own  selves  in  our  con- 
duct and  volitional  tendencies,  also  the  actions,  dispositions  and 
personalities  of  others,  and  finally  indirectly  various  possible 
ends  of  the  will.     All  these  judgments  are  subsumed  under  the 
category  of  moral  good  or  evil. 

2.  Moral  judgments  come  under  the  universal  category  of 
value-judgments.     They  are  in  strong  contrast  with  the  nat- 
ural or  hedonistic  value-judgments,  but  they  may  be  classed 
with  the  intellectual,  the  aesthetic  and  the  religious  value-judg- 
ments. 

3.  In  order  to  understand  the  essence  of  the  moral  judg- 
ment,   it   is   especially   necessary   to  distinguish   it   from   the 
aesthetic   judgment,     (a)   Frequently   the  moral   and  the   es- 
thetic judgments  play  into  each  other  and  are  occasionally  made 
to  approximate  each  other  too  closely  by   science,      (b)  But 
even  when  the  two  judgments  —  the  aesthetic  and  the  moral  — 
are  both  directed  to  one  and  the  same  person  or  act,  they  yet 
both  set  out  from  entirely  different  standpoints.     The  moral 
judgment's  question  is  as  follows :     In  what  relation  does  the 
will  of  the  agent  stand  to  a  requirement  acknowledged  to  be 
unconditional  ?     But  the  aesthetic  judgment  is  concerned  with 
the  following  question:     In  what  relation  does  the  act  or  per- 
son under  contemplation  stand  to  our  fantasy  which  images  that 


108      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

act  or  person,  and  in  what  degree  and  in  what  direction  does 
the  act  or  person  stimulate  a  play  of  the  fantasy  in  us  ?  (c) 
From  the  standpoint  of  the  diversity  of  the  standards  of  judg- 
ment we  may  see  -the  difference  between  the  aesthetic  and  the 
moral  judgment  upon  the  same  act  or  person,  but  at  a  higher 
stage  the  aesthetic  judgment  is  not  uninfluenced  by  the  moral, 
but  discovers  in  every  moral  volition  and  act  something  of  sub- 
limity and  beauty. 

§101.  The  Idea  of  Freedom  and  Accountability. 

1.  The  idea  of  the  moral  freedom  of  the  will  is  indissolubly 
united   in  our  consciousness  -with   the  thought   of  the  moral 
"  ought,"  therefore  with  every  moral  judgment  concerning  our- 
selves and  others,  and  with  every  moral  demand.     In  distinc- 
tion from  the  untenable  construction  of  liberum  arbitrium  in- 
differentiae  we  understand  by  freedom  of  the  will  the  capacity 
of  man,  by  means  of  energetic  regard  for  the  moral  law  of  which 
he  is  conscious,  to  give  that  law  the  preference  against  his  na- 
tural impulses  and  inclinations  in  the  decisions  of  Jife  which 
he  must  make.1 

Note  to  §101 : 1 

1.  Liberum  arbitrium  indifferentiae  means  characterless  choice. 
The  view  overlooks  facts  of  heredity  and  environment,  and  especially 
that  in  and  through  conduct  there  grows  up  a  deposit  of  habit  and 
character  which  inwardly  determines  choices  and  conduct.  It  over- 
looks this  influence  of  previous  choices  on  the  present  choice.  It  takes 
an  atomistic  view  of  life,  according  to  which  character  is  impossible 
and  choice  is  always  as  free  and  undetermined  as  if  the  individual 
had  never  chosen  before. 

2.  The  moral  freedom  is  to  be  distinguished  from  psychical 
or  intellectual  freedom  in  general,     (a)   By  psychical  freedom 
we  mean  that  state  of  consciousness  in  which  reflection  upon  the 
whole  content  of  our  ego  is  possible,  and  along  with  this  a 
clearly  conscious  deliberation  and  decision  of  the  will.     This 
does  not  yet  exist  in  early  childhood,  is  abrogated  by  mental 
disease  and  is  injured  by  diminution  of  clear  consciousness, 
(b)   The  existence  of  this  psychical  freedom  is  the  indispen- 
sable presupposition  of  the  occurrence  of  any  clear  reflection 
upon  moral  requirements.     Therefore  we  may  subsume  an  act 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      199 

of  will  under  the  idea  of  moral  -freedom  of  the  will  only  so  far 
as  we  may  assume  psychical  freedom. 

3.  The  intimate  connection  of  this  thought  with  that  of  a 
moral  requirement  comes  to  expression  in  this,  viz.  that  we 
combine  the  two  thoughts,  psychical  and  moral  freedom,  into 
the  unitary  idea  of  responsible  moral  personality.  We  evalu- 
ate a  man  as  responsible  moral  personality,  when,  abstracting 
from  all  other  relations,  we  consider  what  interior  attitude  he 
occupies,  by  means  of  free  decision  of  the  will,  to  the  moral 
law  of  which  he  is  conscious,  or  what  energy  he  has  inwardly 
summoned  in  his  conflict  against  moral  evil  and  in  order  to 
keep  that  law. 

§102.  The  Processes  of  Conscience  as  Psychical  Forms  of  the 
Manifestation  of  the  Ideas  of  Moral  Law  and  of  Free- 
dom. 

1.  In  actual  moral  life  the  ideas  of  the  moral  law  and  of 
freedom  are  by  no  means  always  conceived  with  conceptual 
clearness  and  conscious  purpose.     Rather  they  make  themselves 
felt  in  us  originally  with  involuntary  power  and  under  strong 
feeling  in  the  so-called  processes  of  conscience.     These  proc- 
esses may  be  analyzed  into  different  groups  —  into  phenomena 
of  a  positive  and  others  of  a  negative  character  after  and  before 
an  act. 

2.  After  the  act  the  following  features  present  themselves 
in  the  phenomena  of  a  conscience  which  condemns  or  censures: 
(a)   the  frequently  involuntary  recollection  of  the  deed  that 
was  done  and  at  the  same  time  a  more  or  less  clear  idea  of 
what  we  ought  to  have  done ;    (b)    a  lively  feeling  of  pain, 
which  cleaves  to  the  deed  done  and  in  which  that  deed  in  itself 
is  felt  to  be  a  depreciation,  a  dishonoring  of  the  self;  (c)  an 
inner  necessitation  to  consider  the  self  that  wills  as  the  decisive 
cause  of  the  deed. 

3.  Before  the  deed,  quite  analogous  features  are  exhibited  in 
the  phenomena  of  a  warning  conscience,     (a)   Here  also  we 
have  the  idea  of  the  evil  act  designed,  along  with  the  more  or 
less  distinct  picture  of  the  act  which  we  must  acknowledge  that 
we  ought  to  do.      (b)   The  feeling  of  pain  which  cleaves  to  the 
schism  which  the  designated  act  threatens  to  bring  into  our 


200      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

inner  life,     (c)   Our   impulse,   founded  in  the  consciousness 
that  our  will  is  decisive  in  the  matter,  to  leave  the  act  undone. 

4.  The  phenomena  of  an  approving  conscience  or  of  a  good 
conscience  before  and  after  the  act  do  not  manifest  themselves 
in  so  intensive  feeling  as  is  the  case  with  the  opposite  phe- 
nomena.    Still  the  thesis  is  not  tenable  that  the  good  conscience 
is  simply  the  absence  of  the  evil  conscience;  rather  there  can 
be  a  positive  feeling  of  inner  certainty  as  to  the  act  and  of 
inner  joyousness  after  the  act  mighty  enough  to  outweigh  the 
opposite  feeling  of  pain. 

5.  These  fundamental  types  of  the  phenomena  of  conscience 
exhibit  in  real  life  the  most  diverse  individual  modifications. 
Very  diverse  is  the  degree  of  the  delimitation  over  against 
allied  inner  processes  and  deliberations;  equally  so  the  degree 
of  intellectual  reflection.     These  are  given  in  the  fact  that  the 
processes  of  conscience  are  frequently  clothed  in  a  religious 
form. 

6.  These  observations  are  corroborated  by  the  history  of  the 
theories  concerning  conscience.     For  example,  history  shows 
us  a  very  gradual  development  of  terminology.     Moreover,  va- 
rious erroneous  views  have  become  associated  with  the  appre- 
hension of  the  processes  of  conscience.     For  example,  there  is 
the  view  of  a  special  faculty  of  the  soul,  called  "  conscience." 
Again  there  is  the  view  of  a  law-giving  conscience  innate  in  all 
men.     As  against  these  two  views  it  must  be  granted  that  the 
content  of  conscience  with  different  peoples  at  different  times 
shows  considerable  diversity.     There   has   been   an   historical 
development  of  conscience  in  human  society,  and  the  idea  of  an 
"  erring  conscience  "  is  not  true  to  this  idea  of  development 
A  "  growing  conscience  "  had  better  be  substituted. 

7.  In  connection  with  all  this  the  question  arises,  viz.,  Are 
the  ideas  of  moral  law  and  of  freedom,  to  whose  truth  the 
processes  of  conscience  so  powerfully  witness,  rendered  uncer- 
tain by  that  historic  diversity  in  their  validity  to  which  we 
have  referred  ?  1 

Note  to  §102:  7 

1.  Are  the  moral  ideas  true,  and  what  do  we  mean  by  their  being 
true? 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      201 

B.    THE  TRUTH  OF  THE  MAIN  MORAL  IDEAS 

§103.  The  Controversies  over  and  the  New  Interpretations  of 
the  Idea,  of  the  Moral  Law. 

1.  Moral  conscience  has  its  history.  This  fact  has  been  em- 
ployed not  only  to  contest  its  universal  validity  but  to  deny  all 
Tight  to  the  thought  of  an  unconditioned  law  at  all.1  (a)  It 
is  maintained  that  the  ideas  of  "  good  "  and  "  evil  "  are  only 
the  arbitrary  invention  of  a  part  of  society,  i.  e.  of  the  strong 
who  desire  to  establish  their  power  over  the  weak  in  this  way, 
or  of  the  weak  who  oppose  their  slave-morality  to  the  rule  of 
the  strong.  The  latter  is  best  represented  by  Nietzsche  (Gen- 
ealogy of  Morals).2  (b)  Others  explain  these  ideas  as  an 
involuntary  deception.  Certain  laws,  customs,  rules  of  life, 
were  enacted  originally  merely  for  the  common  welfare,  but  this 
origin  of  these  customs  and  rules  was  gradually  forgotten.  On 
this  account  the  rules  were  honored  as  something  unconditioned. 
But  we  have  found  out  how  the  rule  came  to  be,  and  hence  it 
has  lost  its  power  over  us.  When  one  knows  more  accurately 
the  genesis  and  growth  of  the  moral  and  of  conscience,  their 
special  dignity  vanishes.  That  was  practically  the  position  of 
Feuerbach,  some  of  the  French  encyclopaedists,  and  in  his  later 
years  of  Strauss  himself.  There  are  hints  of  this  in  Hume's 
work  also. 

Notes  to  §103 : 1 

1.  Where  in  the  course  of  its  development  has  the  moral  conscience 
universal  validity?     Can  you  take  the  cross-section  of  a  procession 
and  absolutize  it?     You  take  some  point  in  the  relative  and  say  that 
it  is  absolute,  but  you  look  again  and  it  has  gone  on  a  stage.     This 
constitutes  the  objection  raised  against  formal  ethics  by  teleological 
or  functional  ethics. 

2.  Nietzsche's  notion  of  slave-morality  as  an  invention  of  aristo- 
cratic individuals  for  the  masses  is  analogous  to  the  old  idea  of  re- 
ligion as  an  invention  of  the  priests.     But  there  is  no  use  in  talking 
of  the  bindingness  of  what  is  known  to  be  an  invention. 

2.  From  another  quarter  it  is  admitted  that  the  thought  of 
"  ought "  along  with  the  processes  of  conscience  are  inescapable 
for  man  and  for  humanity.  They  cannot  be  shaken  off.  But 
at  the  same  time  this  thought  is  so  interpreted  that  at  bottom 


202      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

its  peculiarity  and  the  peculiarity  of  the  moral  processes  in 
general  are  lost.1  We  may  distinguish  the  following  tend- 
encies, which  also  admit  of  manifold  combinations:  (a)  He- 
donistic morality.  According  to  this  the  so-called  moral  laws 
or  requirements  are  only  counsels  on  the  basis  of  experience 
and  rational  reflection,  to  the  end  that  we-  may  win  the  highest 
individual  pleasure,  or  well  being.2  (b)'  The  social-utilitarian 
morality.  According  to  this  the  moral  laws  are  justifiable 
rules,  by  following  which  a  state  of  the  greatest  possible  happi- 
ness to  the  greatest  possible  number  will  ensue.  To  be  sure 
this  view  harks  to  (a)  above  in  part.  But  in  part  also  it 
points  forward  to  (c)  the  altruistic  moral  impulse,  or  feeling. 
According  to  this  the  moral  laws,  or  requirements,  are  the  ex- 
pression of  the  natural  sympathetic  or  altruistic  impulse  which 
is  powerful  in  man,  either  on  account  of  original  endowment, 
or  on  account  of  natural  selection  and  heredity.3  With  this 
latter  thought  we  touch  upon  (d)  the  evolutionistic  ethics.  Ac- 
cording to  this  the  moral  laws  are  only  the  formulae  which 
fix  the  natural  law  of  human  development,  simply  according  to 
the  stage  of  knowledge  at  any  given  time,  and  these  laws  of 
course  bring  to  expression  on  one  hand  the  developmental  tend- 
ency of  the  individual  nature;  on  the  other  hand  that  of  the 
nature  of  the  human  species  in  general.4 

Notes  to  §103 :  2 

1.  One  cannot  get  rid  of  the  thought  of  "  ought,"  but  one  may 
so  interpret  it  as  to  get  rid  of  belief  in  its  bindingness. 

2.  We   are    always    inclined    to   hedonize    the    moral,    instead    of 
moralizing  the  hedonic. 

3.  The  peculiarity  of  the  moral  is  evaded  in  this  view,  according 
to  which  an  impulse  (albeit  a  noble  one)  takes  the  place  of  oughtness. 

4.  Does  the  evolutionistic  and  functional  account  of  the  genesis 
of  conscience  do  away  with  its  bindingness,  or  is  it  still  true  that  a 
thing  is  what  it  is,  not  what  it  came  from  ?    It  is  the  essence  of 
formal  ethics  (e.  g.  Christian  ethics)  to  hold  that  conscience  is  the 
voice  of  God  in  man,  that  the  moral  law  is  the  diviire  command.     Must 
it  be  regarded  any  the  less  as  divine  in  view  of  its  growing  up  from 
the  sub-moral   and  the  pre-moral?     Is   there  a  conception  of   God 
which  does  not  leave  out  the  essential  reality  of  God,  in  harmony 
with  which  you  can  conceive  the  voice  of  conscience,  even  with  this 
lowly  origin,  as  nevertheless  the  voice  of  God  ?     Can  conscience  come 
from  an  animal  origin  and  yet  express- the  will  of  God?     Conscience 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      203 

is  characterized  by  becoming,  as  against  mere  being.  May  it  be  that 
God  is  Becoming,  rather  than  static  Being?  May  it  be  that  it  is  at 
the  end  of  the  process  rather  than  at  the  beginning  that  the  Ab- 
solute is  to  be  found  ? 

Thus  does  the  ethical  problem  land  us  in  metaphysics. 

3.  Two  questions  are  constantly  confounded  in  all  these  con- 
troversies and  transformations,  viz.  the  genetic  question  and  the 
critical  question.  The  genetic  question  has  to  do  with  the  be- 
coming and  the  growth  of  moral  ideas,  whether  it  be  of  these 
moral  ideas  in  general  or  of  their  definite  content.  The  critical 
question  has  to  do  with  the"  importance,  or  better,  the  inner 
teleological  necessity  of  the  moral  requirements  for  the  life  of 
the  individual  and  humanity.  These  two  questions  are  to  be 
carefully  distinguished  and  kept  apart.  How  much  of  num- 
bers 1  and  -2  above  is  correct  as  answer  to  the  genetic  question  ? 
Now  it  is  not  the  task  of  Christian  ethics  to  take  up  this  genetic 
question.  We  must,  however,  more  accurately  define  the  crit- 
ical question,  (a)  Is  the  thought  of  an  "  ought  "  at  all  un- 
necessary, as  number  1  above  affirms  ?  (b)  Is  that  thought  in- 
wardly necessary,  but  simply  as  means  to  the  attainment  of  a 
natural  end  otherwise  given  ?  (c)  Or  is  that  thought  inwardly 
necessary  because  it  itself  first  discloses  to  us  an  absolutely 
worthf  ul  higher  end  ? 

§104.  The  Truth  of  the  Idea  of  the  Moral  Law.1 

1.  In  order  to  answer  the  complicated  question  we  have  to 
seek  first  of  all  the  inalientable  worth  for  the  individual  man 
of  the  requirement  of  conscience  which  involuntarily  asserts 
itself,  (a)  By  way  of  direct  exposition  it  may  be  said  that 
we  have  in  the  moral  law  a  norm  conceived  and  acknowledged 
by  ourselves,  as  contrasted  with  our  being  driven  about  by  nat- 
ural law,  and  with  this  norm  we  also  have  a  supreme  inner  end 
of  life.  We  hereby  see  also  a  way  opened  up  in  order  to  the 
unity  and  freedom  of  our  inner  life;  in  order  to  the  spiritual 
dignity  of  our  personality.2  (b)  This  proof  is  clarified  and 
corroborated  by  the  indirect  proof  that  if  we  abandon  obedience 
to  an  unconditioned  "  ought,"  we  fall  a  victim  to  inner  divided- 
ness  and  dissipation,  and  to  dependence  upon  nature  in  us  and 
around  us;  also  by  the  indirect  proof  that  neither  discretion 


204     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

nor  the  clever  calculation  of  utility,  neither  civil  law  nor  so- 
cial custom,  neither  art  nor  science  can  save  us  from  this  ca- 
lamity.3 (c)  The  two  series  of  thoughts  (a  and  b  above)  com- 
bine in  the  idea  that  in  all  the  activities  of  man  the  basic  tend- 
ency of  the  human  spirit  toward  unity  and  freedom  and  to- 
ward an  inner  content  of  life  is  manifest ;  that,  however,  the 
tendency  cannot  be  consummated  without  the  collection  and 
organization  of  the  will  under  the  requirement  of  conscience, 
or  of  the  unconditioned  "  ought." 

Note  to  §104 

1.  See  Windelband's  Praeludien,  chapter  on  critical  and  genetic 
method. 

Notes  to  §104 : 1 

1.  The  self-dependence  of  the  inner  life  must  be  maintained  against 
naturalism  as  well  as  against  traditionalism.     Impulses  must  be  con- 
verted into  servants  of  moral  purpose.     There  must  be  a  remainder- 
less  etbicization  of  the  sub-ethical. 

3.  The  spirit  of  Jesus,  which  made  modern  culture  possible,  must 
ever  save  us  from  that  culture.  Culture  and  piety  are  not  necessarily 
at  variance  with  each  other.  The  one  thing  needful  is  the  perfect 
moral  fellowship  born  of  faith  in  God. 

2.  The  acknowledgment  of  the  imperative  of  conscience  has 
similar  worth  for  human  society,     (a)   It  is  not  meant  by  this 
that  emphasis  should  be  placed  on  the  worth  that  the  validity 
of  the  moral  law  has  for  the  outer  condition  of  society  or  of 
the  folk,      (b)   Rather  by  way  of  indirect  proof  is  it  to  be 
emphasized  that  humanity  is  dishonored  and  degraded  by  set- 
ting aside  or  by  changing  the  moral  law  or  the  idea  of  the 
good,  in  order  to  a  fellowship  on  the  basis  of  nature  or  of  in- 
terest, even  though  this  fellowship  be  of  a  highly  refined  char- 
acter,     (c)   But  there  is  also  a  direct  exposition  which  comports 
with  this.     In  what  does  the  dignity  or  worthiness  of  humanity 
consist,  and  in  what  does  the  sacredncss  and  consecration  of  the 
collective  life  of  man  consist?     The  answer  is,  In  considering 
the  goal  of  humanity  to  be  the  organization  of  itself  into  a  king- 
dom of  moral  personalities  under  the  lead  of  an  unconditioned 
"  ought." 

3.  The  above,  in  dependence  upon  the  permanent  thoughts 
of  Kant,  is  an  exposition  of  the  importance  and  significance 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      205 

which  the  imperative  of  conscience  has  for  the  life  of  the  hu- 
man spirit,  and  it  decides  in  favor  of  the  third  and  against  the 
first  two  questions  at  the  close  of  §103.  But  it  offers  at  the 
same  time  the  possibility  of  acknowledging  at  least  the  relative 
rights  of  the  hedonistic,  the  utilitarian,  the  altruistic  and  the 
evolutionistic  ethics,  and  of  bringing  this  relative  right  to  va- 
lidity in  the  treatment  of  the  genetic  question  of  which  men- 
tion has  already  been  made.1 

Note  to  §104 : 3 

1.  The  germ  can  not  grow  without  the  stuff  disintegrating. 

4.  The  Christian  view,  which  acknowledges  a  holy  command- 
ment of  God  in  the  moral  law,  not  only  can  but  must  embody 
these  considerations  that  have  been  set  forth,  must  therefore 
combine  theonomy  with  autonomy.  But  the  Christian  view  re- 
minds us  that  our  treatment  needs  supplementing  on  two  sides. 
The  validity  of  the  law  of  conscience  will  be  able  to  attain  to 
full  clearness  and  power  only  (a)  when  it  is  first  filled  with  a 
correct  content,  and  (b)  when  it  is  articulated  in  the  system  of 
a  comprehensive  view  of  the  world.  This  is  the  task  for  Part 
C  in  our  general  treatment. 

§105.  The  Truth  of  the  Idea  of  Freedom.     Determinism  and 
Indeterminism. 

1.  With  the  controversies  and  transformations  which  have  to 
do  with  the  concept  of  the  moral  law  (§104)  there  is  combined 
as  a  rule  a  controversy  or  transformation  of  the  idea  of  moral 
freedom  presented  in  §101,  therefore  a  deterministic  view  of 
freedom.  But  diverse  tendencies  are  to  be  distinguished  within 
determinism  itself,  as  follows:  (a)  A  group  by  itself  may  be 
called  religious  determinism,  which  deduces  the  impossibility 
of  a  free  will  (a)  from  the  power  of  human  sin,  or  (/3)  from 
the  work  of  divine  grace,  as  well  as  (y)  from  the  omnipotence 
and  omniscience  of  God,  (a)  being  anthropological  determinism, 
and  (/8)  and  (y)  theological  determinism,  (b)  In  distinction 
from  this  group  there  are  two  groups  of  philosophical  determin- 
ism: (a)  the  materialistic  group,  which  considers  the  processes 
of  the  will  only  as  sequential  phenomena  of  the  processes  of  the 
brain  which  take  place  according  to  natural  law ;  (ft)  the  ideal- 


206      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

istic  group,  which,  to  be  sure,  honors  the  spiritual  life  as  self- 
dependent,  but  yet  considers  the  course  of  ideas  and  also  of 
the  moral  volitional  processes  to  be  according  to  natural  neces- 
sity. In  this  connection  we  are  concerned  mainly  with  philo- 
sophical determinism,  more  particularly  in  its  idealistic  form.1 
Note  to  §105  : 1 

1.  The  point  at  which  I  deviate  from  most  modern  statements  is 
with  reference  to  that  subsuming  of  motive  and  conduct  under  cause 
and  effect,  which  is  the  essence  of  determinism.  The  cause  and  ef- 
fect category  does  justice  to  the  passivity-moment  resident  in  all 
reality,  but  not  to  the  activity-element  also  present  in  all  reality. 
There  is  a  gradedness  of  activity,  which  is  a  criterion  of  the  dignity 
of  all  reality.  If  the  static  had  been  original,  processes  would  not 
have  started  at  all.  The  active  moment  is  necessarily  first.  This 
much  of  truth  there  is  in  the  notion  of  an  Urthat  —  an  original 
archetypal  act  by  virtue  of  which  man  gave  himself  the  character 
which  thenceforth  determines  his  acts.  But  instead  of  having  the 
Urthat  isolated,  let  it  be  immanent  and  constant.  To  say  that  the 
essence  of  a  is  that  it  is  caused  solely  by  b  is  to  explain  everything 
ultimately  by  nothing.  If  the  old  static  view  is  right,  then  determin- 
ism is  right ;  but  if  the  static  is  a  deposit  of  the  active,  then  freedom 
is  necessarily  true.  For  why  predicate  activity  of  all  else  and  deny 
it  of  yourself? 

2.  Philosophical  determinism  appeals  for  support  to  three 
groups  of  reasons,  viz.  (a)  the  metaphysical  or  epistemological 
consideration,  that  the  causal  law  excludes  the  assumption  of 
the  freedom  of  the  will ;  (b)  psychological  considerations,  that 
observation  of  the  psychic  life  shows  that  even  every  conscious 
act  is  determined  by  motives,  and  that  the  motives  themselves 
in  turn  proceed  from  inner  endowment  and  outer  circumstances 
that  render  even  a  calculation  of  the  decision  of  the  will  possible 
in  many  cases;  (c)  social-scientific  considerations,  that  observa- 
tion of  the  social  life  yields  the  fact  of  heredity,  and  that  sta- 
tistics, especially  moral  statistics,  exhibit  a  natural  legal  regu- 
larity, even  of  the  acts  of  the  human  will. 

3.  But  the  question  arises  whether  these  reasons  of  philo- 
sophical determinism  are  cogent.     As  regards  (a)   above,  two 
remarks  may  be  made.     For  one  thing,  the  so-called  causal  law 
is  nothing  but  a  postulate  of  knowledge  that  a  calculable  regu- 
larity of  happening  exists.     But  whether  and  in  what  scope 
this  postulate,  so  fruitful  for  natural  knowledge,  is  also  ap- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      207 

plicable  to  the  life  of  the  human  spirit  —  this  is  precisely  the 
question.  For  the  other  thing,  metaphysics  and  epistemol- 
ogy  have  overlooked  the  moment  of  activity  which  is  imma- 
nent and  constant  in  all  reality.  As  regards  (b)  above,  the 
psychological  investigation  does  establish  the  existence  of  mo- 
tives, but  it  finds  at  the  same  time  that  in  our  moral  decisions 
the  consciousness  of  freedom  is  combined  with  this  conscious- 
ness of  motivation.  If  it  be  said  that  this  consciousness  of 
freedom  is  false  or  is  an  illusion,  it  is  difficult  to  see  why  the 
same  remark  should  not  be  made  with  reference  to  the  conscious- 
ness of  motivation.  But  the  main  point  in  this  connection  is 
that  whether  this  consciousness  of  freedom  be  true  or  false,  em- 
pirical psychological  investigation  cannot  determine,  and  for 
this  reason  the  appeal  to  psychology  in  support  of  determinism 
is  defective.  Now  as  to  (c)  above,  social-scientific  observation 
does  rightly  call  attention  to  hereditary  predisposition  and  to 
the  influence  of  society  and  to  outer  relations  and  circumstances. 
These  forces  thus  appealed  to  do  render  decisions  in  favor  of 
the  morally  good  difficult,  but  it  is  also  true  that  eventually  such 
decisions  may  be  rendered  easier  by  such  predispositions.1  But 
one  thing  is  not  excluded  by  these  forces,  viz.  that  the  measure 
of  energy  with  which  the  individual  in  his  struggle  against 
anti-ethical  impulses  and  outer  influences  reacts  upon  the  com- 
mandment of  his  conscience,  is  a  thing  of  freedom.  The  so- 
called  statistical  laws  do  indeed  declare  that  there  is  a  certain 
regularity  as  regards  moral  actions,  if  we  take  into  account  large 
social  groups  and  stretches  of  time.  But  these  laws  yield  no 
such  disclosure  concerning  the  character  of  motivation  in  the 
case  of  the  single  agent. 

Note  to  §105 :  3 

1.  As  against  the  passivity  of  heredity,  emphasize  the  activity  resi- 
dent in  the  individual  life. 

4.  The  above  are  considerations  to  be  urged  against  the  argu- 
ments for  determinism.  To  these  we  may  add  counter-argu- 
ments against  determinism,  (a)  Determinism  must  explain 
as  illusions  the  convictions  which  involuntarily  assert  them- 
selves in  connection  with  moral  conduct,  (a)  Explanation 
from  determining  inner  and  outer  factors  takes  the  place  of 


208      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

moral  responsibility  and  accountability,  or  imputation.  (/?) 
The  guilt-feeling  and  remorse  become  mere  pain  with  reference 
to  the  situation,  or  the  endowment  of  education  which  deter- 
mines our  will,  (y)  Moral  evil  itself  becomes  a  malformation 
similar  to  the  pathological  disturbances  of  mental  life.1  (b) 
Since  determinism  abrogates  or  transforms  the  consciousness, 
asserting  itself  in  conscience,  of  the  moral  freedom  of  the  will, 
it  is  not  able  to  treat  with  entire  seriousness  the  elevation  of  man 
above  the  stage  of  a  nature-being.  It  is  true  rather  that  the 
postulate  that  the  idea  of  the  moral  freedom  of  the  will,  along 
with  the  idea  of  the  moral  law,  retains  its  validity,  arises  from 
the  full  recognition  of  the  spiritual  vocation  and  destiny  of 
man.  Such  an  idea,  however,  can  attain  to  full  certainty  only 
in  connection  with  the  whole  view  of  the  world,  and  therefore 
with  the  religious  view  of  the  world  as  well.2 

Notes  to  §105 :  4 

1.  Referring  the  ethical  to  the  psychological,  the  psychological  to 
the  physiological,  and  the  physiological  to  the  physical  —  this  is  the 
naturalistic  regress. 

2.  As   John   Watson   maintains,   a   divorce  between   religion   and 
morality  means  the  destruction  of  both. 

5.  But  an  outcome  of  the  whole  controversy  is  that  the  af- 
firmation of  freedom,  to  be  equal  to  the  assaults  of  determin- 
ism, must  keep  to  correct  limits,  (a)  It  is  to  be  limited  to 
the  moral  decisions  for  or  against  the  command  of  conscience, 
of  which  the  individual  is  himself  conscious,  (b)  No  moral 
decision  is  enacted  in  the  sense  of  an  entirely  undetermined 
liberum  arbitrium  indifferentiae  (v.  §101:1).  But  each  de- 
cision is  made  difficult  or  easy  in  a  certain  degree,  (a)  From 
within  this  is  granted  in  the  inherited  endowment  of  the  indi- 
vidual, which  may  be  favorable  or  unfavorable  to  the  moral 
volition.  This  remark  is  also  true  with  reference  to  inner 
habituation.  As  an  effect  of  the  latter  there  is  a  steady  bent 
of  the  will  toward  the  evil  side,  and  with  this  an  approximation 
to  the  impossibility  of  willing  the  good,  but  also  a  fortification 
of  the  will  in  the  good,  and  an  approximation  to  what  is  called 
material  moral  freedom,  or  control  of  natural  impulses.1  (/?) 
From  without  the  influence  of  human  society  in  which  the  indi- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      209 

vidual  lives  is  important,  not  only  for  the  formation  of  con- 
science, but  also  for  the  achievement  of  moral  or  immoral  de- 
cision. In  this  way  also  the  fulfilment  of  the  commandment 
of  conscience  can  be  highly  improbable  without  the  moral  free- 
dom of  the  will,  i.  e.  the  capacity  to  struggle  against  temptation 
being  thereby  annulled.  With  this  recognition  of  these  aggra- 
vating and  alleviating  circumstances,  justice  is  done  to  the  facts 
adduced  in  2  (b)  and  (c)  above,  i.  e.  to  the  psychological  and 
the  social-scientific  arguments. 

Note  to  §105 :  5 

1.  The  impulses  do  not  remain  as  wild  horses  outside  the  moral 
life.  They  enter  into  the  moral  life  as  constituents  organized  into  it. 

6.  The  conclusion  of  the  whole  matter  then  would  seem  to 
be  this :  the  obligation  of  the  will  through  moral  law  which  pre- 
supposes freedom.  By  freedom  is  meant  here,  however,  the 
capacity  for  self-determination  according  to  motives  of  one's 
own.  The  possibility  of  freedom  in  relation  to  necessity  is  a 
problem  of  philosophy.  The  reality  of  such  freedom  is  the 
subject-matter  of  ethics.  In  reflection  upon  this  subject  many 
theories  have  arisen.  There  is  the  idea  of  compulsion,  or  our 
determination  by  causes  lying  outside  of  ourselves,  and  not  by 
motives  originated  by  ourselves,  i:  e.  of  being  determined  on 
lower  grounds,  by  natural  necessity,  and  not  by  the  higher 
necessity  of  the  good.  This  type  of  determinism  is  what  was 
once  meant  by  "  fatalism,"  what  is  now  meant  by  "  natural- 
ism." If  again  the  determination  is  not  by  a  cause  in  nature 
lying  outside  of  us,  but  by  a  cause  in  God  outside  of  us,  then 
this  is  predestination  and  in  philosophy  may  be  known  as  pre- 
determinism.  The  sum  of  the  objections  to  this  abstract  de- 
terminism is  that  the  theory  is  in  contradiction  with  the  funda- 
mental facts  of  moral  experience.1 

Note  to  §105 :  6 

1.  The  problem  of  philosophy  is  to  see  how  God  is  through  all  and 
in  all,  and  on  the  other  hand  to  see  that  our  wills  are  ours.  The 
solution  of  the  problem  is  to  be  seen  in  the  fact  that  instead  of  the 
divine  efficiency  being  a  menace  to  the  human,  it  is  the  condition 
and  reality  of  the  human  efficiency.  Somehow  in  the  core  of  the 
human  willing  there  is  the  presence  of  the  divine,  but  in  such  a  way 
that  the  human  does  not  cease  to  be  free.  The  ultimate  ques- 


210     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

tion  is  whether  there  is  freedom  immanent  in  reality  as  a  whole,  or 
not.     Only  by  participation  in  the  whole  do  we  enjoy  freedom. 

7.  But  over  against  the  extreme  of  this  determinism  there 
is  the  abstract  indeterminism  —  a  theory  which  says  that  free- 
dom is  a  groundless,  characterless  volition  out  of  empty  in- 
difference.    No  matter  what  the  heredity  or  the  environment  or 
the  past  life,  each  new  act  is  done  regardless  of  them.     This 
theory  presupposes  an  unnatural  idea  of  the  will,  excluding  any 
steady  bent  or  inclination  of  the  will.     It  excludes  education, 
character-forming.     It  leaves  out  of  account  the  fact  that  free 
will  is  a  deliberating  choice  under  motives,  of  which  the  strong- 
est prevails.     The  will  does  not  stand  under  accidental  im- 
pulses in  its  choice,  but  by  rational  reflection  can  generate  new 
motives  which  overbear  the  existing  impulses. 

8.  Now  as  against  determinism  and  against  indeterminism 
there  are  a  number  of  mediating  theories.     One  is  Kant's,  ac- 
cording to  which  freedom  belongs  to  intelligible  character,  the 
noumenal,  but  necessity  prevails  in  empirical  character,  the 
phenomenal.1     Schelling's   and    Schopenhauer's    Urtliat,    "  in- 
telligible "  according  to  Kant's  idea,  gives  man  the  character 
of  freedom,  but  this  Urthat  has  in  its  expression  ever  there- 
after a  determined  character.     This  again  is  predeterminism, 
which  does  not  conform  with  the  facts  of  moral  experience.     In 
these  doctrines  of  Kant,  Schelling  and  Schopenhauer,  the  re- 
lation between   intelligible  and   empirical   character,   between 
free  and  determined,  is  obscure  —  in  Kant's  case,  on  account 
of  his  dualism;  in  the  others,  on  account  of  their  defective 
moral  conceptions  in  general.     But  there  is  a  definition  of  free- 
dom in  contrast  with  both  determinism  and  indeterminism,  as 
self-determination  conditioned  by  character  and  environment 
in  view  of  motives,  and  the  emphasis  is  not  to  be  put  on  the 
self  to  such  an  extent  as  to  render  iminfluential  either  the 
nature  without  or  within,  or  the  motive   (idea  of  the  end). 
Only  by  introducing  those  motives  do  we  lead  up  to  the  higher 
necessity,  the  idea  of  the  good.2 

Notes  to  §105 :  8 

1.  Kant  seems  to  say  man  is  free  noumenally  and  not  free  phenom- 
enally. 

2.  The  lower  necessity  is  that  of  cause  and  effect.     The  higher 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      211 

necessity  is  that  of  the  true,  the  beautiful  and  the  good.  These 
grow,  but  as  Windelband  says,  "  to  prove  relativism  is  to  destroy  it," 
for  relative  proof  is  not  real  proof.  We  have  here  the  old,  beautiful 
problem  (and  I  wish  I  could  give  my  life  to  it)  of  the  relation  be- 
tween cause  and  worth.  It  is  the  ultimate  philosophical  problem. 
Our  ability  to  move  toward  values  as  an  end,  rather  than  toward 
consequences  as  an  end,  is  our  freedom.  What  is  it  that  the  will 
wills?  Not  consequences,  but  goods,  values.  Its  doing  that  is  its 
freedom.  There  is  no  force  outside  of  us  or  in  us  of  a  nature- 
character  which  constitutes  such  a  necessity  as  inhibits  the  higher 
necessity  of  the  true,  the  beautiful  and  the  good. 


C.  THE  HISTORICAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  MORAL 
CONCEPTS,  AND  THE  UNIVERSAL  VALIDITY  OF  THE 
CHRISTIAN  MORAL  VIEWS  * 

§106.  The  Factors  of  Progressive  Moral  Development. 

1.  The  moral  knowledge  and  conduct  of  the  individual  are 
intimately  bound  up  with  the  human  community  and  with 
history.  Already  this  fact  has  been  touched  upon  in  A  and 
B,  especially  in  §102:6,  §103:3,  and  §105:5  (b).  On  the 
one  hand  the  clearness  of  the  moral  conscience  -has  only  grad- 
ually emerged  from  implication  and  confusion  with  custom  and 
right  (v.  §99 :  5  and  6).  On  the  other  hand  the  content  of  con- 
science has  only  gradually  unfolded. 

Note  to  C 

1.  What  gives  interest  to  this  is  the  effort  to  harmonize  the  modern 
development-idea  and  the  Christian  view  of  the  finality  of  the  Chris- 
tian moral  ideal. 

2.  This  unfolding  has  been  essentially  influenced  by  the  de- 
velopment of  the  human  cultural  life  in  all  its  ramifications, 
viz.  the  family  bond,  the  life  of  labor  and  of  gain,  custom, 
the  civil  order,  and  above  all  religion.     With  this  knowledge 
the  relative  right  of  the  views  delineated  in  §103:  1  (b)  and  2 
receives  valid  recognition.     But  in  this  development  the  indi- 
viduals are  not  only  determined  by  those  great  historical  forces 
just  mentioned,  but  they  themselves  react  in  turn  upon  the 
great  cultural  circles.     Especially   do  the  leading  spirits   in 
history  exercise  a  determining  influence  upon  these  circles 

3.  But  this  entire  development,  no  less  than  that  of  science, 


212      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

art  and  religion,  has  for  its  presupposition  the  existence  of 
an  original  spiritual  endowment,  first  of  all  of  a  formal  char- 
acter. This  endowment,  emerging  in  the  phenomena  of  con- 
science, is  nothing  but  the  endeavor,  essential  to  us,  to  order 
the  life  of  our  will  according  to  unitary  norms,  and  this  en- 
deavor is  itself  grounded  in  the  fundamental  tendency  of  the 
human  spirit  (sketched  in  §104:  1,  c)  to  unity  and  freedom, 
and  with  this  to  an  inner  content  of  life.  It  is  only  by  means 
of  this  endowment  that  the  requirements  of  custom,  of  right, 
etc.,  arising  within  history,  can  become  unconditioned  norms 
for  man's  own  self-evaluation,  or  can  become  content  of  con- 
science. On  the  basis  of  the  content  of  conscience  thus  formed, 
he  appropriates  further  content  of  conscience  from  the  histor- 
ical life,  but  exercises  his  critical  thought  at  the  same  time 
upon  the  goods  and  tasks  of  life  historically  given  him. 

4.  This  view  of  the  development  of  the  moral  ideal  harmon- 
izes with  the  Christian  views  of  man  as  the  image  of  'God,  and 
of  the  power  of  sin,  both  being  rightly  understood.  This  har- 
monization is  possible  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  divine  edu- 
cation of  sinful  humanity.1  But  the  idea  of  development  bur- 
dens us  with  the  difficult  problem  as  to  whether  the  absolute- 
ness of  the  Christian  ideal  of  morality  can  be  maintained.2 
To  this  matter  we  now  turn. 
Notes  to  §106 :  4 

1.  Compare  Lessing's  Education  of  the  Human  Race.     But  Lessing 
does  not  take  the  sinful  character  of  humanity  into  account. 

2.  It  was  easy  enough  to  maintain  this  on  the  old  idea  of  revela- 
tion as  immediate  communication  of  truth,  and  on  the  old  view  of 
the  world.     But  if  ideals,  the  Christian  ideal  included,  have  emerged 
out  of  the  heart  of  historical  life,  little  by  little,  you  have  a  different 
problem.     How  can  you  reconcile  the  thought  of  the  growing  char- 
acter of  the  moral  ideal  with  its  absoluteness  ? 

§107.  Proof  of  the  Universal  Validity  of  the  Christian  Ideal 

of  Morality. 

1.  In  order  to  answer  the  question  just  raised  it  is  neces- 
sary to  consider  in  their  main  outlines  the  most  important 
ethical  ideals  which  have  emerged  in  history.  These  are  the 
following:  (a)  the  political  ideal  of  the  welfare  of  the  state 
and  of  civic  virtue,  which  arose  in  antiquity  but  has  experienced 


THE  FOUNDATION  Otf  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      213 

modern  development  (e.  g.  Hobbes) ;  (b)  the  individualistic 
ideal  of  the  self-sufficient  wise  man,  which  passed  over  from 
antiquity  to  the  modern  period  (e.  g.  Nietzsche)  ;  (c)  the 
ascetic  ideal  of  world-flight,  or  world-negation,  which  is  con- 
nected with  mysticism  on  the  one  hand,  with  pessimism  on  the 
other  (e.  g.  Buddhism  and  Schopenhauer)  ;  (d)  the  modern 
aesthetic  ideal  of  energetic  individuality  on  the  soil  of  culture 
(e.  g.  romanticism) ;  (e)  the  utilitarian  ideal  of  the  economic 
welfare  of  society.  Now  all  these  views  are  opposed  to  the 
Christian  ideal,  which  on  its  moral  side  has  for  its  content  a 
fellowship  of  moral  persons  united  by  the  principle  of  self- 
denying  love.1 

Note  to  §107 : 1 

1.  Fellowship  from  the  Christian  point  of  view,  is  not  of  nature- 
beings,  but  only  of  persons.     It  is  the  glory  of  the  Christian  religion 
that  it  stands  for  the  total  ethicization  of  the  natural,  the  kingdom 
of  moral  personalities  in  which  all  are  ends  and  in  which  love  rules. 

2.  We  may  attempt  to  borrow  from  history  itself  our  judg- 
ment concerning  these  various  ethical  ideals  as  compared  with 
the  Christian,      (a)   At  all  events  this  judgment  is  not  to  be 
gained  by  means  of  a  simple  empirical  or  inductive  procedure, 
but  only  through  a  critical  procedure.     The  latter  requires  that 
we  familiarize  ourselves  with  the  various  ideals  as  they  have 
unfolded  themselves  historically  into  their  consequences,  and 
thus  bring  to  consciousness  inwardly  and  vividly  the  worth 
and  un worth  which  they  would  have  for  our  own  life,      (b) 
S-uch  a  procedure  yields  the  following  judgment:     With  refer- 
ence to  1  a  —  the  political  ideal  —  positively  the  knowledge  of 
the  foothold  the  ethical  life  finds  in  the  state  is  worthful.     But 
negatively,  what  is  to  be  opposed  is  the  elevation  of  the  state 
to  an  absolute  ethical  good  and  the  consequent  dependence  of 
the  moral  ideal  on  natural  limits  and  external  authority  (as 
in  Plato  and  Hobbes).     As  to  1  b  —  the  individualistic  ideal  — 
positively,  the  knowledge  of  the  absolute  dignity  of  the  single 
personality    is    worthful.     But    negatively,    the    goal    of    the 
avrapx«ia,  or  self-sufficiency  of  the  wise  man  and  disengagement 
of  the  individual  from  the  historical  community,  are  morally 
questionable.     As  to  1  c  —  the  ascetic  ideal  —  positively,  the 


214     CHRISTIANITY  LN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

thought  of  self-denial  is  worthful.  But  on  the  other  hand, 
negatively,  the  endeavor  to  demolish  nature  itself  is  in  contra- 
diction to  the  moral  ideal.1  As  to  1  d  —  the  aesthetic  ideal  — 
positively,  the  thought  of  individuality  and  of  the  importance 
of  culture  for  the  moral  life  is  worthful.  But  negatively,  wher- 
ever these  goals  are  made  the  highest,  even  the  instability  of 
the  individual  as  well  as  the  deterioration  of  culture  follow 
with  inner  necessity.  As  to  1  e  —  the  utilitarian  ideal  —  posi- 
tively, the  knowledge  of  the  influence  of  economic  relations 
upon  the  spiritual  moral  life  is  important.  But  negatively, 
wherever  economic  welfare  is  made  supreme,  it  leads  to  the 
degradation  of  spiritual  personality,  (c)  On  the  basis  of 
these  critical  judgments  we  may  attempt  to  show  that  all  the 
worthful  elements  of  the  modern  ethical  ideal  may  find  place 
in  the  Christian  moral  ideal,  and  that  there  may  be  avoided 
those  onesidednesses  of  other  ideals  which  have  come  to  light 
in  the  course  of  their  history. 

Note  to  §107 :  2 

1.  The  modern  ethical  ideal  is  that  nothing  in  man  should  be  denied, 
but  all  should  be  organized.  Still,  Christian  thought  retains  this 
older  idea  of  self-denial. 

3.  This  historico-philosophical  reflection  must  issue,  how- 
ever, in  the  effort  at  a  direct  proof  that  the  Christian  ideal  of 
morality  is  in  itself  perfect  and  unsurpassable,  (a)  It  is  in 
itself  perfect,  so  far  as  the  worth  which,  according  to  §104,  an 
unconditioned  "  ought  "  has  for  the  spiritual  life  of  man  comes 
to  full  validity  with  and  only  with  the  Christian  content  of 
the  moral  law.  The  Christian  moral  law  opens  up  to  the  in- 
dividual the  way  to  perfect  unity  and  freedom,  and  with  this 
to  the  supreme  content  of  the  inner  life,  and  it  also  gives  us 
the  goal  of  a  perfected  spiritual  fellowship  for  human  society, 
(b)  The  Christian  ideal  of  morality  is  unsurpassable,  because 
according  to  the  conditions  of  our  human  existence  it  can  be 
neither  extensively  nor  intensively  transcended.  There  is  noth- 
ing higher  than  moral  personality,  intensively,  and  nothing 
higher  than  the  fellowship  of  love  of  such  personalities.  But 
this  is  the  Christian  ideal.  What  we  have  said  is  true,  how- 
ever, only  because  the  Christian  ideal  has  at  the  same  time  in 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      215 

itself  an  infinite  capacity  for  development  —  a  development, 
however,  which,  if  man  forever  remains  man,  shall  be  con- 
tinuous with  what  we  know  of  moral  personality  in  the  fellow- 
ship of  love  in  moral  society. 

4.  But  the  truth  of  the  Christian  ideal  of  morality  can  be 
comprehensively  recognized  only  when  it  is  understood  in  its 
connection  with  the  religious  faith  of  Christianity.  This  points 
us  to  our  next  thought. 

§108.  Morality  and  Religion,     Christian  Revelation  and  the 
Question  of  a  Religionless  Morality.1 

1.  It  is  precisely  the  connection  between  morality  and  reli- 
gion that  is  opposed  by  the  representatives  of  religionless  moral- 
ity, (a)  They  urge  the  following  points  against  religious 
morality,  or  against  the  connection  of  morality  with  religion:  2 
(a)  that  it  renders  the  validity  of  the  moral  law  insecure;3 
(/?)  that  it  establishes  a  dependence  upon  external  authority;  4 
(y)  that  it  cripples  moral  energy;5  (8)  that  it  corrupts  the 
moral  motive  by  the  outlook  to  rewards  and  punishments ;  9 
(e)  that  it  introduces  morally  worthless  works  along  with  moral 
conduct.7  (b)  In  the  positive  working  out  of  its  standpoint  as 
well  as  in  the  establishment  of  its  religionless  ethics,  it  itself 
occupies  a  very  diverse  attitude,  now  atheistic,  now  agnostic 
toward  religion ;  also  it  tends  to  the  deification  of  the  moral.8 

Note  to  §108 

1.  [See  Pfleiderer's  article  in  the  American  Journal  of  Theology 
for  1908.] 

Notes  to  §108 : 1 

2.  Just  as,   historically,   science  and  morality   and   religion  were 
inextricably   interfused,   and   one  by  one  the  sciences   came  to   be 
emancipated  from  religious  control,  so  morality  seeks  emancipation, 
as  a  part  of  the  great  movement  for  independence. 

3.  If  morality  is  essentially  connected  with  religion,  how  can  it 
have  more  validity  than  religion?     If  duty  depends  on  the  will  of 
God,  and  we  do  not  know  that  there  is  a  God,  we  do  not  know  God's 
will,  or  our  duty. 

4.  From  the  point  of  view  of  this  criticism,  the  will  of  God  is 
necessarily  external  to  my  will.     This  assumes  a   God-idea  which, 
while  once  held,  is  not  a  necessary  one. 


216      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

5.  For  example,  in  quietism,  predestinationism,  and  the  appeal  to 
providence  instead  of  depending  on  one's  own  energy. 

6.  The  religionless  ethicists  claim  that  promising  happiness  and 
heaven  as  the  reward  of  virtue  is  immoral,  in  that  it  is  supplying 
something  other  than   the  moral  as   a  motive  to   the  moral.     The 
reward  of  morality  is  not  happiness;  it  is  morality,  moral  strength 
for  further  moral  conduct.    Do  good  because  it  is  good,  and  not  for 
any  other  reason. 

7.  We  have  only  energy  and  time,  and  these  ought  to  be  devoted  to 
the  production  of  values.     Ought  any  of  our  energy  and   time  to 
be  drawn  off  from  the  moral  tasks  of  life,  and  devoted  to  cult,  to 
religious  exercises?     Is  it  immoral  to  do  that?     Or  is  cult  a  means 
to  moral  activity  and  so  a  moral  act  ? 

8.  The  exclusion  of  God  from  ethics  and  the  deification  of  the 
moral  are  analogous  to  the  earlier  outlawing  of  God  by  the  scientists 
and  their  deification  of  law.     God  is  moral,  but  that  is  not  all  of  God. 

2.  Critical  judgment  upon  religionless  morality  may  be  made 
as  follows:  (a)  On  the  basis  of  history.  An  appeal  to  his- 
tory shows  that  with  individuals  indeed  an  energetic  moral  life 
can  persist  without  religious  faith ;  but  that  in  the  case  of  the 
life  of  peoples,  moral  ideas  have  been  pervasive  and  powerful 
only  in  connection  with  the  corresponding  religious  views  of 
the  world.1  (b)  On  the  basis  of  systematic  considerations. 
If  we  desire  to  become  clearly  conscious  of  our  position  as 
morally  struggling  beings,  the  question  as  to  the  meaning  and 
order  of  the  world  in  their  relation  to  our  moral  endeavor  must 
be  raised.2  To  this  question  either  a  positive,  a  negative  and 
pessimistic,  or  an  agnostic  answer  is  possible.  Of  these  three 
answers  the  last  two,  if  their  consequences  be  not  arrested, 
bring  with  them  an  inner  exhaustion  of  the  moral  life. 

Notes  to  §108: 2 

1.  It  does  not  follow  that  what  is  true  in  the  case  of  a  few  indi- 
viduals would  be  true  of  the  whole  people.  The  home  can  be  kept 
up  with  one  deaf,  dumb  and  blind  person ;  but  if  everybody  were  thus 
afflicted,  it  would  be  a  different  proposition.  Is  not  the  religionless 
moral  individual  upborne  by  religious  convictions  in  the  community 
about  him  and  the  traditions  which  enter  into  his  very  blood?  I 
know  of  nothing  which  the  religionless  ethicists  can  urge  against  it. 
Much  of  the  morality  of  such  an  individual  is  like  the  afterglow  of  a 
sun  which  has  set.  He  is  like  a  man  who  can  keep  a  good  degree 
of  health  while  living  an  unhealthful  life,  owing  to  his  patrimony 
of  health.  And  is  it  not  true  that  the  moral  individual  may  become 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      217 

more  beautiful  and  helpful  through  the  influence  of  religion?  Is 
there  not  a  certain  hardness  and  austerity  about  religionless  morality, 
which  needs  to  be  softened  and  beautified  by  religion?  Might  not 
some  great  savage  personality,  looming  up  on  pagan  soil,  be  inclined 
to  ask,  What  is  the  good  of  your  civilization?  And  yet,  does  it 
follow  that  he  would  not  be  greater  if  he  were  civilized?  There  are 
elements  of  a  humanizing  character  which  come  through  religious  in- 
fluences. Moreover,  the  appeal  to  history  shows  that  persistence  of 
moral  values  depends  on  the  religious  values  persisting. 

2.  If  we  did  not  believe  that  the  structure  and  function  of  the 
universe  were  such  as  to  render  the  production  of  values  possible, 
we  should  not  try  to  produce  them.     The  attempt  to  raise  a  crop  of 
moral  values  argues  the  belief  that  it  can  be  done,  and  this  is  an 
essentially  religious  belief. 

3.  This  criticism  implies  the  assertion  that  a  positive  ethical 
view  of  the  world  is  necessary  as  background  of  the  practical 
moral  life,      (a)   An  unconditioned  moral  end  may  be  assumed 
by  us  only  upon  the  conviction  that  such  an  end  is  not  only 
striven  for  by  us,  but  is  assigned  us  by  the  unconditioned 
World-Ground,  and  is  at  the  same  time  the  all-conditioning  end 
of  the  world-reality  itself.1      (b)   Thus  the  postulate  of  a  moral 
end  of  the  world  and  of  a  moral  order  of  the  world  springs  up 
from  the  ethical  life  itself.     The  concept  of  "  postulate  "  im- 
plies that  this  assumption  is  required  by  irrepressible  inner 
need,  but  that  no  coercive  empirical  or  speculative  proof  can 
be  given  for  the  assumption. 

Note  to  §108:3 

1.  If  I  am  a  part  of  the  world-reality,  and  if  by  my  nature  and 
by  the  requirements  of  that  reality  my  chief  good  is  moral,  it  is  im- 
possible that  the  World-Ground  should  not  be  moral  and  have  a 
moral  end. 

4.  The  postulate,  however,  first  finds  its  authentication  in 
religious  faith,     (a)   Although  the  postulate  arises  with  inner 
necessity,  the  mere  standpoint  of  postulate  is  in  itself  insuffi- 
cient.    It  impels  us  to  the  question  as  to  the  evidence  of  the 
sway  of  moral  end  in  the  world,  evidence  which  even  if  not 
logically  cogent  to  the  intellect,  is  not  on  that  account  unin- 
telligible and  is  yet  convincing  to  the  heart,     (b)   Such  evi- 
dence is  possible  only  as  revelation  that  is  accessible  to  religious 
faith,  that  is  the  correlate  of  religious  faith.     Within  human 


218      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

history  we  have  such  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ,  in  the  person 
of  Jesus,  i.  e.  in  the  world-conquering  grandeur  of  his  fellow- 
ship with  God,  in  his  holy  love  for  man,  and  in  the  redeeming 
spiritual  power  issuing  from  him.  (c)  This  revelation  in 
Jesus  Christ  establishes  the  confident  certainty  both  of  the 
absolute  truth  of  the  Christian  idea  of  morality  as  the  God- 
given  destiny  and  vocation  of  man,  and  of  the  necessity  of  the 
victory  of  this  Christian  moral  ideal  over  all  the  world  and  the 
resistance  of  the  evil  of  the  world.  Therewith  the  Christian 
moral  life  receives  its  unique  motivation. 

5.  Therefore  the  Christian  ethic  is  not  touched  by  the  re- 
proaches which  are  raised,  according  to  1  a,  by  the  religionless 
ethicists  against  religious  ethics.     As  to  a  in  1  a,  it  is  precisely 
in  Christian  faith  that  the  validity  of  the  moral  law  comes  to 
full  certainty.     As  to  ft  in  1  a,  the  moral  law  is  inwardly  ac- 
knowledged as  a  law  of  freedom.     As  to  y  in  1  a,  the  most  pow- 
erful motive  is  given  for  moral  conduct.     As  to  8  in  1  a,  the 
expectation  of  reward  is  freed  from  all  egoistic  character.     As 
to  e  in  1  a,  every  morally  worthless  task  is  done  away.1 

Note  to  §108 :  5 

1.  The  common  needs  of  common  men  take  precedence  over  any 
creed  or  cult,  any  form  or  ceremony,  any  tradition  or  institution, 
however  hoary  or  majestic.  This  was  a  fundamental  position  with 
Jesus.  Note  his  attitude  toward  the  Sabbath  law  and  the  hunger 
of  his  disciples,  the  temple  offering  (showbread)  and  the  hunger  of 
man.  The  money-changers  in  the  temple  were  occupying  space  pre- 
pared for  and  devoted  to  the  Gentiles,  and  so  Jesus  drove  them  out. 
How  (even  at  that  stage  in  the  development  of  human  ideals)  he  went 
directly  to  the  core  of  the  ethical  thought  of  the  primacy  of  man's 
needs  as  against  the  venerable  institutions  of  the  past.  And  Jesus 
was  no  iconoclast,  no  ruthless  radical.  He  made  no  direct  assault 
on  traditional  institutions.  He  said  the  end,  the  reaching  of  the 
moral  goal  was  the  thing  of  supreme  value,  and  that  other  things 
were  to  be  valued  only  as  means  to  that  end.  And  Jesus  was  willing 
to  contribute  his  part  toward  the  doing  away  of  hindrances  to  re- 
alizing the  moral  end,  even  to  the  giving  of  his  life. 

The  objections  of  the  religionless  ethicists  are  valid  only  against 
the  excrescences  of  religion.  To  make  the  objection  universal  is  like 
condemning  art  because  there  are  vulgar  post  cards. 

6.  From  this  proof  of  the  truth  of  the  Christian  moral  views 
in  which  the  foundation  of  Christian  ethics  terminates,  it  fol- 


THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS      219 

lows,  however,  that  the  superstructure  of  Christian  ethics  must 
take  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  as  its  fundament.1 

Note  to  §108 :  6 

1.  Parallel  with  this,  other  ethical  systems  would  seek  a  meta- 
physical basis.  Christian  ethics,  in  its  appeal  to  historic  revelation, 
is  more  pictorial. 


PAET  II.  THE  SUPEKSTRUCTUKE  OF  CHRIS- 
TIAN ETHICS 

§109.  Sources  and  Method. 

1.  Christian  ethics  undertakes  to  expound  the  Christian  ideal 
of  life  on  the  basis  of  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ. 
Like  Christian  dogmatics,  Christian  ethics  is  dependent  upon 
the  Scriptures.     In  the  New  Testament  especially  it  finds  a 
rich  ethical  material.     Not  only  in  the  narrative  of  Jesus' 
words  and  deeds,  but  also  in  the  epistles,  with  their  instructions 
to  the  churches  and  their  disclosures  of  Christian  personalities. 
But  the  Old  Testament  also  is  rich  in  ethical  doctrines. 

2.  Certain  principles  are  valid  for  the  employment  of  this 
ethical  material  of  the  Bible  in  Christian  ethics,     (a)   It  can 
not  be  employed  in  the  sense  of  a  statutory  law,  on  account  of 
(a)  its  unequal  worth,  (/?)  its  special  historical  relations,  (y) 
its  unsystematic  character;  above  all,  however,  on  account  of 
the  peculiarity  of  Christianity  itself.1      (b)   Rather  this  ethical 
material  is  to  be  critically  sifted  and  ordered.     In  this  task 
we  may  be  guided  by  the  following  question:     What  can  and 
ought  to  be  certain  and  practicable  for  us,  through  self-depend- 
ent personal  trust  in  the  Savior,  Jesus  Christ,  as  being  content 
of  the  Divine  Will  ? 

Note  to  §109 :  2 

1.  Christianity  is  not  a  religion  of  the  letter,  but  of  the  spirit; 
not  of  legalism  and  casuistry  and  consequent  atomism  of  conduct, 
but  of  disposition  and  of  the  unity  and-  freedom  of  the  moral  life. 

3.  This  interrogatory  determines  in  general  the  procedure  of 
Christian  ethics.     Christian  ethics  thus  shapes  itself  as  parallel 
to  Christian  dogmatics.     It  not  only  allows  the  authoritative 
eternal  validity  of  the  revealed  will  of  God  to  come  to  its  right, 
but  it  indicates  at  the  same  time  that  the  divine  will  can  be 
known  only  in  self-depend.ent  appropriation  on  the  part  of  man, 
and  can  be  applied  to  changing  human  relations.1 

Note  to  §109: 3 

1.  Only  that  in  the  Bible  is  authoritative  which  is  revelation  of 
220 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     221 

God,  and  only  that  is  revelation  of  God  which  is  capable  of  being 
appropriated  by  the  ethico-religious  life  of  man,  i.  e.  by  faith.  If 
this  be  criticized  as  landing  in  subjectivity,  I  admit  it  and  point 
out  its  inevitability. 

4.  The  history  of  Christian  morals  is  an  essential  auxiliary 
to  Christian  ethics.     It  shows  us  rich  progress  in  knowledge, 
but  also  the  by-ways  of  error  which  have  been  taken.     Even 
the  confessions  of  the  various  evangelical  churches  are  of  im- 
portance in  this  history,  as  yielding  the  Protestant  understand- 
ing of  the  ideal  of  the  Christian  life. 

5.  The  special  task  of  Christian  ethics  requires  that  a  free 
employment  of  the  ethical  material  of  the  Scriptures  and  of 
the  confessions  be  much  more  universally  recognized  than  in 
Christian  dogmatics.     Yet  in  the  existing  elaborations  of  ethics 
those  diverse  methods  are  reflected  which  may  be  distinguished 
from  Christian  dogmatics  (v.  §36  supra),  viz.  the  development 
of  moral  doctrine  out  of  the  Christian  consciousness  and  ex- 
perience.    There  are  also  the  speculative,  the  biblicistic  and 
the  confessional  methods  in  Christian  ethics  as  in  Christian 
dogmatics;  but  there  are  many  transitions  and  mediations  be- 
tween them.     The  important  thing  for  all  these  methods  is 
that  they  shall  take  into  account  (a)  faith's  understanding  of 
the  historical  revelation,  (b)  the  teleological  unfolding  of  the 
Christian  goal  of  life  thus  known  with  reference  to  the  various 
relations  of  life. 

6.  Our  task  now  is  to  see  in  what  sense  the  revelation  of  God 
in  Jesus  Christ  is  the  basis  of  the  new  Christian  life;  then 
secondly  to  see  this  Christian  life  in  its  unfolding  in  connec- 
tion with  the  secular  tasks  of  history. 

A.    THE  REVELATION  OF  GOD  IN  JESUS  CHRIST  AS  THE 
BASIS  OF  THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  LIFE 

a.  THE  NEW  ETHICAL  GOAL  OF  LIFE  KEVEALED  IN  JESUS 
CHRIST. 

§110.  The  Kingdom  of  God  Revealed  in  Jesus  as  the  Chief 

Good  and  as  the  Ethical  Norm* 

1.  In  faith  in  God's  revelation  in  Jesus  Christ  we  become 
certain  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  the  absolutely  worthful  di- 


222      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

vine  end  of  the  world.  This  idea  of  kingdom  of  God  is  used 
in  Christian  dogmatics  as  a  central  idea.  Whether  this  same 
idea  is  admissible  as  central  in  Christian  ethics,  whether  the 
idea  of  kingdom  of  God  may  be  employed  at  all  as  an  ethical 
concept,  is  a  question  which  has  been  much  discussed  in  modern 
times. 

2.  From  an  investigation  of  the  synoptic  concept  of  the  king- 
dom of  God  the  following  may  be  concluded,      (a)   "  Kingdom 
of  God  "  does  not  primarily  designate  an  ideal  to  be  actualized 
through  the  activity  of  the  human  will,  but  the  future  state  of 
the  unlimited  kingly  dominion  of  God,  a  state  to  be  hoped  for 
on  account  of  God's  omnipotent  power.     But  it  is  precisely 
because  kingdom  of  God  is  thus  rule  of  God  that  it  presents 
itself  as  the  chief  good  which  Jesus  proffers  to  man,  and  this 
chief  good  is  throughout  of  a  spiritual  ethical  character,  viz. 
the  full  fellowship  with  the  holy,  perfect  God,  and  participa- 
tion in  the  perfect  fulfilment  of  his  holy  will,      (b)   But  ethical 
requirements  are  united  with  the  proclamation  of  this  good. 
The  kingdom  of  God  is  promised  as  reward  for  conduct  accord- 
ing to  God's  commandments.     Yet  it  is  at  the  same  time  itself 
the  supreme  norm  of  our  will.1     For  the  divinely  commanded 
conduct  is  as  to  content  nothing  but  the  seeking  after,  and  a 
filial  acceptance  of  the  proffered  kingdom  of  God  and  likeness 
to  the  perfect  God,  all  of  which  we  win  even  here  with  the 
practice  of  true  righteousness,  especially  of  self-denying  love, 
but  which  is  to  be  perfected  only  in  full  fellowship  with  the 
heavenly  Father,      (c)   Thus  the  fulfilment  of  the  ethical  re- 
quirements themselves  become  the  paving  of  the  way  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  on  earth.     The  kingdom  of  God,  at  least  ac- 
cording to  its  inner  side,  becomes  actual  now  and  here,  where 
men  (a)  through  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  trust  God  as  their  heav- 
enly Father,  and  (/?)  practice  true  righteousness  —  above  all, 
brotherly  love.     The  former  (a)  is  the  religious  relation;  the 
latter  (/?),  the  moral  relation.     According  to  this  understand- 
ing of  the  words  of  Jesus  worked  out  into  their  consequences, 
the  chief  good  of  the  kingdom  of  God  itself  becomes  the  su- 
preme ethical  ideal  after  all. 
Note  to  §110:2 
1.  Topic  for  investigation :    Is  .Tesus'  conception  of  reward  ethical  ? 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     223 

3.  Now  this  ethical  import  of  the  concept  "  kingdom  of  God  " 
recedes  in  the  apostolic  witness  in  favor  of  the  eschatological 
side,  but  does  not  drop  away  entirely.     Paul  in  particular  gave 
it  clear  expression,  especially  in  Romans  14 : 17,  "  The  king- 
dom of  God  is  righteousness  and  peace  and  joy  in  the  Holy 
Ghost." 

4.  Also  in  the  history  of  Christian  doctrine  the  idea  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  has  been  employed  again  and  again  according 
to  its  ethical  side,  viz.  in  the  hierarchy  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church,  where  it  was  indeed  perverted  into  a  secular  world- 
power;  also  in  the  evangelical  purity  of  the  Reformers,  whose 
view  experienced  an  abridgment  in  subsequent  Pietism  and  a 
moralistic  turn  in  philosophy.1 

Note  to  §110 : 4 

1.  The  "  Kingdom  of  God  "  notion  has  oscillated  between  the  exclu- 
sively religious  and  the  exclusively  moral,  between  the  apocalyptic 
and  the  secular.  When  primitive  Messianism  dropped  out,  and  men 
had  to  turn  attention  to  the  secular  side  of  life,  the  outcome  was  a 
great  reaction  from  the  apocalyptic  notion  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
to  the  secular.  Luther  stands  for  reaction  against  that  acute  secu- 
larization in  Catholicism,  and  returns  with  power  to  the  religious 
content  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  on  the  moral  side  away  from  the 
Catholic  secularism  to  duties  in  state  and  family.  In  pietism  the 
view  of  the  Reformers  suffered  abridgment,  and  in  Kant  the  idea 
becomes  exclusively  moral.  Today  historical  science  maintains  that 
the  primitive  Christian  conception  of  the  kingdom  of  God  was  of 
something  wholly  miraculous  and  future,  which  man's  will  could 
do  nothing  to  bring  about,  but  which  he  could  be  prepared  for 
through  repentance.  Yet  the  core  of  Jesus'  thought  of  the  kingdom 
of  God  is  ethical. 

5.  The  idea  "  kingdom  of  God  "  is  in  fact  peculiarly  fitted 
to  be"  a  designation  of  the  ethical  ideal  of  Christianity,  for  it 
indicates  (a)  the  founding  and  the  finishing  of  that  ideal  by 
God  himself;  (b)  the  preparation  for  that  ideal  in  an  ethical  — 
indeed,  in  both  a  religious  and  an  ethical  —  self-activity  on  our 
side ;  (c)  the  individual  as  well  as  the  social  side  of  that  ethical 
ideal ;  (d)  the  capacity  of  the  ideal  to  pervade  earthly  relations 
as  well  as  to  point  to  a  future  in  hope,  which  is  essential  to  the 
ideal.     Thus  one  and  the  same  idea  "  kingdom  of  God  "  can  be 
central  in  Christian  dogmatics  and  in  Christian  ethics. 


224      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

§111.  The  Divine  Law  Preached  by  Jesus  in  its  Distinction 
from,  Other  Laws  of  Life. 

1.  The  direction  of  life  which  is  implicitly  defined  in  the 
concept  "  kingdom  of  God  "  is  explicitly  unfolded  by  Jesus  in  a 
series  of  commandments,  or  in  a  new  law  of  life  for  his  dis- 
ciples.    In  this  particular  there  is  a  similarity  with  other  reli- 
gions which  are  bound  in  legal  precepts  for  their  disciples ;  but 
there  is  a  fundamental  difference,  not  to  be  overlooked. 

2.  Jesus'  law  of  life  may  remind  us  of  the  ascetic  law  of  other 
religions  of  redemption.1     (a)   In  recent  times  in  particular 
the  commandment  of  Jesus  has  been  explained  on  many  sides 
as  essentially  ascetic   (e.g.   Tolstoi,  Nietzsche),      (b)   In  fact 
there  are  many  words  in  which  Jesus  seems  to  require  celibacy, 
poverty  and  the  foregoing  of  one's  rights  (this  last  being  what 
Catholics  call  "  humility  "  in  their  "  celibacy,  poverty  and  hu- 
mility").2     (c)   But   the   following  considerations   are   to   be 
urged  against  the  idea  that  the  ascetic  tendency  was  dominant 
with  Jesus:     (a)   Jesus'  own  appearance  and  the  impression 
which  he  made  upon  the  people;  3  (/?)  Jesus'  judgment  that  not 
the  absorption  of  self  in  God,  but  the  redemption  of  the  soul 
is  the  highest  goal;  4  (y)  Jesus'  warfare  against  all  self-chosen 
performances  through  which  the  simple  and  obvious  command- 
ments of  God  are  subordinated  and  abbreviated ;  B   (8)  Jesus' 
express  rejection  of  fasts  for  his  disciples.6     (d)   But  while  the 
ascetic  tendency  is  not  the  dominant  one,  the  commandments 
of  self-denial  retain  for  Jesus  their  full  significance,      (a)   The 
positive  commandment  of  Jesus  to  seek  the  kingdom  of  God  and 
its  righteousness  imposes  the  requirement  upon  all  his  disciples 
to  equate  no  earthly  good  with  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  to 
crucify  all  impulses  and  inclinations  which  resist  true  righteous- 
ness.7     (/?)   But  it  was  simply  upon  a  narrower  circle  of  his 
disciples  that  Jesus  imposed  the  requirement  to  take  upon  them- 
selves all  the  denial  and  privation  involved  in  the  calling  of  a 
preacher  of  the  gospel  at  that  time. 

Notes  to  §111 :  2 

1.  Was  Jesus  an  ascetic? 

2.  The  Catholics  said  obedience  to  Jesus  is  necessary,  and  so  is 
the  secular  life  in  the  world,  but  the  same  person  cannot  do  both. 
So  they  divided  Christians  into  two  classes,  one  to  obey  Jesus,  and 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTUKE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     225 

the  other  to  do  the  work  of  the  world.  The  first  class,  it  was  held, 
might  gain  superfluous  merit,  such  as  could  be  used  to  help  out  with 
the  salvation  of  the  large  number  necessarily  engaged  in  secular 
callings.  Against  this  Luther  protested  that  what  we  know  to  be 
the  will  of  God  is  just  our  vocation,  our  daily  task  in  the  secular 
life.  The  Roman  Catholic  Church  is  a  great  political  institution, 
but  its  solution  of  the  moral  problem  is  worthless.  It  evades  the 
problem,  really.  The  worst  feature  of  monasticism  has  not  been  its 
immorality,  but  its  ideal  of  perfection.  Luther  saw  this,  and  that 
to  live  in  one's  God-given  vocation,  falling  in  line  with  the  order  of 
the  world  is  to  obey  God.  In  determining  what  was  morally  neces- 
sary, he  started  from  the  requirements  of  one's  position  in  the  world, 
interpreted  as  the  will  of  God.  He  did  not  start  from  the  precepts 
of  Jesus.  He  was  no  connoisseur  in  the  art  of  modernizing  Jesus. 
And  the  Reformers  were  right  in  this  insight  that  the  natural  duties 
of  life  are  the  will  of  God,  in  the  doing  of  which  one  finds  God,  even 
if  it  may  have  been  a  truth  which  was  not  in  their  Bibles. 

But  is  not  the  question  as  to  whether  we  can  confess  Jesus  as 
Leader  and  Lord  a  question  of  the  life  and  death  of  Christianity? 
Even  so,  may  we  not  be  outwardly  detached  from  him  and  inwardly 
bound  to  him,  and  may  not  the  former  be  a  condition  of  the  latter? 
It  is  not  his  words  as  such,  but  the  morally  necessary  that  must  be 
obeyed.  The  words  of  Jesus  are  not  new,  but  he  was.  We  can  be 
like  his  character,  only  by  being  unlike  his  conduct.  Imitation  of 
Jesus  leads  to  unveraciousness.  Let  us  apply  Jesus'  own  principle 
to  his  own  words,  binding  our  lives  to  the  eternally  good  in  him, 
and  thus  exemplifying  not  the  subjection  of  the  servant,  but  the 
obedience  of  the  free. 

3.  He  was  not  like  John  the  Baptist  and  the  Essenes. 

4.  Schopenhauer  says  Jesus  was  an  ascetic;  that  he  would  have  us 
end  with  the  absorption  in  God,  which  is  the  dissolution  of  person- 
ality.   But  Jesus'  thought  was  the  opposite  of  this;  he  would  have 
us  become  personalities. 

5.  The   Catholic   system   of  morality   has   initiated,    selected,    in- 
vented and  stipulated  things  to  be  done  which  are  not  in  the  moral 
order  of  the  world,  but  capriciously  tacked   on  to   it.     This   arbi- 
trary invention  of  devices  other  than  the  moral  order  of  the  world 
to  discipline  one's  own  life  is  to  take  our  discipline  out  of  the  hands 
of  God. 

6.  Jesus  would  have  nothing  in  morality  but  the  moral;  nothing 
in  religion  but  the  religious. 

7.  Note  the  parable  of  the  rich  fool,  the  question  about  dividing 
the  inheritance,  and  the  saying  about  plucking  out  one's  eye  or  cut- 
ting off  one's  hand. 

3.  Also  the  distinction  between  Jesus'  law  of  life  and  all  law- 
religions  is  a  fundamental  distinction.  This  is  already  based 


226     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  the  relation  of  Christianity  to  the  Old  Testament  law.  To 
be  sure,  Jesus  developed  his  religio-ethical  law  of  life  in  direct 
adhesion  to  the  Old  Testament  law.  But  for  all  that  it  can 
be  designated  a  new  law,  for  (a)  as  to  content,  Jesus  made  the 
new  law,  in  that  it  is  the  sum  of  the  law  and  the  prophets. 
This  position  signifies  a  sharpening  and  an  internalizing  of  the 
Old  Testament  law,  but  also  a  critical  reduction  of  that  law, 
which  yet  at  the  same  time  amounted  to  an  enrichment,  (b) 
Also  as  to  its  character,  the  law  is  thus  transformed  into  a  law 
of  freedom  which  will  be  inwardly  acknowledged  and  fulfilled 
from  within  outward.  Moreover,  it  has  a  different  position 
in  the  whole  of  religion.  This  relation  to  the  Old  Testament 
law  is  confirmed  by  the  apostolic,  especially  the  Pauline  appre- 
hension of  the  content  and  character  of  the  Christian  law  of 
life,  which  is  that  of  the  fulfilment  of  the  law. 

4.  With  this  new  spiritual  understanding  of  the  law,  the 
problem  arises  how  the  "  good  and  honest  heart  "  comes  to  be, 
for  such  a  heart  alone  can  freely  fulfil  the  internalized  or  spirit- 
ualized law. 

§112.  The  Law  of  Gfod  in  its  Main  Content  as  Preached  by 
Jesus. 

1.  The  content  of  the  law  of  life  as  preached  by  Jesus  is  most 
briefly  summed  up  in  the  two  basic  laws,  i.  e.  in  the  religious 
commandment  of  unlimited  love  to  God,  and  in  the  moral  com- 
mandment of  love  to  neighbor. 

2.  The  central  moral  commandment  of  neighbor-love,  which 
finds  a  practical  elucidation  in  the  words,  "  Love  thy  neighbor 
as  thyself,"  possesses  a  critical  power  over  against  our  self- 
love.     But  it  wins  its  comprehensive  normative  power  through 
the  concept  "  kingdom  of  God,"  and  thus  primarily  through 
the  love  of  God  himself,  which  he  discloses  to  us.1     In  this  con- 
nection the  idea  of  neighbor-love  may  be  more  sharply  defined 
as  follows:     (a)   The  supreme  end  of  neighbor-love  is  fellow- 
ship with  the  neighbor  in  the  kingdom  of  God.     Every  external 
benefit,  but  also  all  deference  or  compliance,  find  their  supreme 
justification  in  this  larger  thought ;  find  also  their  standard  and 
limitation,     (b)  The  object  of  love  is  the  neighbor  as  a  being 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     227 

homogeneous  with  us  by  nature,  and  with  us  destined  to  spirit- 
ual personality,  (c)  The  scope  of  love  is  so  designated  by 
TOV  TrAT/o-tov  (the  neighbor)  that  the  fellowship  of  love  transcends 
all  external  limits,  but  yet  is  capable  of  an  articulation  and  in- 
dividualization  according  to  the  natural  orders  of  God.2  (d) 
According  to  psychological  form,  love  is  a  disposition  and  tend- 
ency of  the  will,  combined  with  self-denial.  (Love  of  enemy 
is  the  supreme  test.)  But  love  is  at  the  same  time  a  feeling 
of  joy  in  one's  neighbor.3  (How  can  joyous  love  be  commanded 
by  a  "  Thou  oughtest  "  ?) 

Notes  to  §112 :  2 

1.  According  to  Nietzsche  no  one  does  or  can  love  his  neighbor  as 
himself.     Is  he  right  ? 

2.  The  fellowship  of  love  transcends  rank  and  vocation,  the  na- 
tional and  the  sexual,  conditions  of  poverty  and  wealth,  stages  of 
culture,  the  color  of  the  skin,  and  goes  out  to  man  as  man.    But 
along  with  this  and  on  the  basis  of  the  natural  order  of  the  world, 
I  may  feel  toward  my  own  race  and  nation  and  parents  and  friends 
as  I  do  not  toward  others.     At  one  extreme  is  an  attenuated  uni- 
versalism ;  at  the  other  is  jingoism  all  around. 

3.  The  end  of  love  is  fellowship.     The  limitations  of  love  must  be 
inwardly,  not  outwardly  determined.     If  an  enemy  sets  limits  to  love, 
love  has  lost  its  freedom.     The  enemy  is  the  supreme  one  of  those 
external  limits  which  love  ought  to  transcend.     One  hears  few  ser- 
mons on  the  love  of  enemies.     It  is  because  it  seems  a  Utopian  de- 
mand, and  because  its  signficance  is  not  understood. 

3.  Along  with,  or  rather  before  the  moral  commandment  of 
neighbor-love,  we  have  the  central  religious  commandment  of 
love  to  God.  (a)  In  distinction  from  the  mystical  absorption 
in  God  the  Christian  love  of  God  corresponding  to  the  Christian 
God-idea  has  for  its  subject  the  real  ego  living  in  the  world 
which  teleologically  subordinates  all  the  experiences  and  tasks 
of  this  world  to  God.  But  just  on  this  account  it  is  opposed 
to  the  love  of  the  world,  (b)  Its  essence  is  reverence  and 
trust  toward  God  —  these  in  intimate  union,  (c)  Its  prac- 
tical manifestation  is  the  practice  of  trust  in  God,  of  resignation 
to  God,  of  joyousness  and  thankfulness  in  all  the  experiences 
of  life,  but  at  the  same  time  of  obedience  to  God's  moral  com- 
mandment, above  all  the  fulfilment  of  the  commandment  of 


228      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

brotherly  love.  It  is  in  this  connection  that  we  see  how  inti- 
mately the  two  great  commandments  belong  together.  (How 
can  love  to  God  be  commanded  by  a  "  Thou  oughtest "  ?) 

4.  The  two  commandments,  love  to  God  and  to  neighbor, 
taken  together  determine  the  entire  Christian  ideal  of  life,  and 
at  the  same  time  regulate  the  entire  region  of  human  life.  For 
although  they  give  norm  directly  only  to  the  relation  to  God 
and  to  fellow-men,  they  yet  indirectly  give  the  guiding  prin- 
ciples for  the  formation  of  one's  own  personal  life,  and  for 
the  relation  to  the  world  of  nature.  They  remind  us  how  our 
whole  life  in  all  its  relations  ought  to  be  consecrated  to  God, 
and  therefore  like  the  holiness  or  perfection  of  God ;  and  they 
set  us  a  task  whose  greatness  is  at  once  uplifting  and  humbling. 

§113.  The  Revelation  of  the  Christian  Ideal  of  Life  in  the 
Person  of  Jesus  Christ  Himself;  or,  Jesus  as  Example. 

1.  Jesus  not  only  preached  the  Christian  law  of  life;  he 
ideally  manifested  it  as  revealer  of  God  and  the  perfecter  of 
humanity  in  his  own  person.     He  thus  presents  himself  as 
exemplar  or  model   to  which  we  are  to  become  similar.1 
Note  to  §113 : 1 

1.  But  note  the  just  criticism  directed  against  all  mere  imitation 
in  morality  and  religion,  as  also  against  the  copy-theory  in  knowledge. 
There  is  a  copy-theory  in  ethics  and  religion.     But  we  are  active  in 
knowing,  and  in  framing  and  realizing  ideals  also. 

2.  Jesus'  all-regulative  model  does  not  consist,  as  the  Catholic 
Church  and  mysticism  say,  in  the  peculiarity  of  his  vocational 
work  and  the  external  circumstances  of  his  life  connected  there- 
with.    But  Jesus  is  model  in  the  disposition  expressed  in  his 
vocation,  i.  e.  in  his  inner  bearing  to  God  and  to  man,  or  in 
his  whole  personality  consecrated  to  God. 

3.  Thus  understood  the  model  of  Jesus,  in  spite  of  his  his- 
torical limitedness,  is  yet  intensively  perfect  and  all-embracing. 
It  is  true  that  he  has  not  moved  in  all  the  regions  of  life,  yet 
he  gives  the  supreme  spiritual  norm  which  can  and  ought  to 
be  applied  freely  (in  freedom)  to  all  regions  of  life.1 

Note  to  §113 :  3 

1.  It  is  not  right  to  follow  any  calling  which  renders  the  practice 
of  the  spirit  of  Jesus  impossible. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     229 

b.  THE  NEW  ETHICAL  POWER  OF  LIFE  GIVEN  IN  JESUS 
CHBIST. 

§114.  The  Need  of  a  Renewing  Ethical  Power  of  Life. 

1.  Is  the  Christian  goal  of  life  attainable,  and  if  so,  how? 
This  question  points  first  of  all  to  the  concreate  moral  and  re- 
ligious endowment  of  man.     On  the  basis  of  this  endowment  a 
moral  conscience  is  formed  in  the  individual  under  the  influ- 
ence and  culture  of  human  society  (v.  §102).     This  conscience 
is  religiously  determined,  however  (v.  §108).     We  have  here 
then  in  this  religious  determination  a  point  of  connection  for 
the  recognition  of  the  Christian  ideal  of  life.     We  have  here- 
with then  an  indispensable  presupposition,  but  we  do  not  have 
a  guarantee  for  the  actual  fulfilment  of  this  ideal. 

2.  The  deeper  we  recognize  in  conscience  the  right  and  the 
height  of  the  Christian  norm  of  life,  the  livelier  does  the  con- 
sciousness of  our  contradiction  to  that  norm  and  so  of  our  guilt 
become,  but  at  the  same  time  of  our  inability  to  attain  to  a 
real  inner  love  of  God  and  neighbor  solely  on  the  ground  of 
that  universal  human  presupposition.     For  we  are  convinced 
through  our  conscience  of  the  power  of  the  "  flesh  "  dwelling 
in  us,  which  does  not  persist  moreover  without  our  guilt,  and 
which  is  aggravated  by  sinful  habit.     At  the  same  time  we  ex- 
perience also  the  power  of  sin  and  temptation  surrounding  us 
in  human  society.     Thus  we  become  aware  of  a  kingdom  of  sin, 
of  which  we  are  ourselves  members.1 

Note  to  §114 :  2 

1.  Sin  is  not  mere  "vestigia,"  mere  survivals  of  animalism  in 
man.  That  position  has  as  its  general  theory  the  naturalistic  view 
of  the  world,  and  instead  of  its  being  ennobling  to  man,  it  is  de- 
grading. If  man  is  active  in  his  goodness,  he  cannot  be  merely 
passive  in  his  badness.  There  is  a  moment  of  activity  in  all  reality. 
Sin  is  an  activity,  a  product  of  the  spirit  of  man.  The  naturalistic 
view  of  sin  is  as  full  of  error  as  the  naturalistic  view  of  man  in  gen- 
eral. No  man  can  disown  his  sins  till  he  first  owns  them.  One  of  the 
errors  and  evils  of  the  development  theory  is  this  wrong  idea  of  sin. 

This  idea  of  the  "  kingdom  of  sin  "  may  be  over-emphasized,  but 
it  is  no  figure  of  speech,  but  a  fact.  Sin  is  a  social  reality  as  well 
as  an  individual  reality.  There  is  action  and  reaction  between  the 
individual  and  society,  as  there  is  between  the  individual  organ  and 
the  organism. 


230      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

3.  In  this  idea  of  kingdom  of  sin  there  is  no  religious  .de- 
terminism which  transforms  sin  into  a  determinateness  of  na- 
ture (spirit).     Yet  there  is  the  conviction  of  the  universality 
of  sin  and  this  expresses  the  element  of  truth  in  religious  de- 
terminism.    Freedom  to  fight  for  the  good  known  to  us,  guilt 
and  responsibility  are  not  annulled  by  the  thought  of  the  king- 
dom of  sin,  or  by  the  element  of  truth  in  religious  determinism. 
Still  we  are  not  able  to  calculate  the  degree  of  this  guilt  or 
responsibility,  nor  even  the  degree  of  the  freedom.1 

Note  to  §114 :3 

1.  It  is  pretty  certain  that  any  harsh  judgment  is  liable  to  be 
wrong.  No  condemnation  of  an  evil  is  quite  moral  which  does  not 
involve  the  condemnation  of  ourselves  in  connection  with  it.  No 
judgment  passed  upon  conduct  from  without  can  be  adequate.  The 
crimes  of  a  city  are  fruits  on  the  tree  of  life  of  that  city,  and  mere 
denunciation  on  the  part  of  the  public  is  like  the  tree  assuming  a 
damnatory  attitude  toward  its  own  fruits.  "  Make  the  tree  good 
and  its  fruit  good." 

4.  From  the  fact  of  this  state  of  sin,  however,  it  follows  that 
if  an  honest  love  of  God  and  neighbor  are  attainable  by  us, 
we  need  an  ethical  power  of  life,  annulling  the  separating  power 
of  guilt  and  counteracting  the  power  of  sin  in  us  and  around 
us,  and  able  to  draw  us  on  into  the  perfect  good. 

§115.  The  Renewing  Ethical  Power  of  Life  Given  to  Us  in  the 
Idea  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

1.  That  postulated  divine  power  of  life   is  proclaimed  in 
Christian  faith  as  reality.     We  are  directed  to  divine  grace 
and  its  efficiency  through  the  Holy  Spirit. 

2.  And  this  is  in  accord  with  the  New  Testament  idea  that 
the  "  Spirit  of  God  "  (ureO/ua  0eoi5)  is  not  only  the  cause  of  ex- 
traordinary "gifts"   (xap«r/*aTa),  but  also  the  effective  power 
which  produces  the  ethico-religious  life  of  the  Christian.     But 
the  Holy  Spirit  does  this  not  as  mere  nature-power,  working 
in  a  nature-like  way,  or  by  magic,  but  as  an  ethically  obligating 
norm. 

3.  The  task  of  Christian  ethics  is  to  make  intelligible  how 
far  and  how  the  Spirit  of  God  is  able  to  exercise  this  motivat- 
ing power  in  us.     Paul  identifies  the  Spirit  with  the  exalted 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     231 

Christ,  working  in  the  believer.1  In  the  gospel  of  John  the 
earthly  and  exalted  Christ  inwardly  appropriated  by  us  is  set 
forth  as  the  creative  power  of  the  new  religio-ethical  life.  In 
Jesus  Christ's  spirit,  i.  e.  in  the  controlling  tendency  and  de- 
termining power  of  his  personal  life  and  work,  God's  Spirit, 
or  God,  is  operating  as  the  One  who  inwardly  communicates 
himself  to  us.2 

Notes  to  §115 :  3 

1.  In  the  time  of  Paul  demoniacal  possession  was  taken  literally,  as 
an  actual  psychological  fact.     And  so  it  was  no  figure  of  speech  when 
Paul  said  that  Jesus  dwelt  in  him  and  in  the  believer,  and  said  the 
same  of  the  Holy  Spirit.     It  would  have  been  hard  from  their  point 
of  view  to  have  thought  otherwise.     What  in  this  old  psychology  was 
time-historical  and  transitory  and  any  longer  impossible?     And  what 
can  we  retain  ?    We  can  take  "  the  fruits  of  the  spirit "  in  our  lives, 
and  in  face  of  the  universal  and  common  mystery  of  the  relation  of 
God  and  man,  we  can  interpret  them  as  due  to  the  universal  spirit,  im- 
manent in  the  spirit  of  man. 

2.  Jesus  does  it,  and  yet  God  does  it. 

4.  In  this  manner  the  way  to  the  solution  to  the  ethical  task 
is  opened.  Our  question  now  comes  to  be  the  following:  In 
how  far  is  Christ  himself  operating  as  impulse  and  power  to 
new  religio-ethical  life,  or  the  supposition  of  faith  in  Jesus 
Christ  as  it  is  awakened  in  the  Christian  through  the  gospel  ? 

§116.  The  Operative  Motive  for  the  Ethico-Religious  Life  Pro- 
ceeding from  Jesus  Christ. 

1.  The  question  now  to  be  considered  was  prominent  in  the 
time  of  the  Reformation.  It  was  the  old  controversy  concern- 
ing faith  and  good  works.  It  was  the  fundamental  conviction 
of  the  Reformers  that  out  of  faith  itself  good  works  must  grow.1 
This  conviction  of  theirs  was  unfolded  into  various  single 
thoughts  as  follows:  (a)  Good  works  come  from  the  Holy 
Spirit,  being  simultaneously  given  with  faith,  (b)  Good 
works  must  be  done  propter  mandatum  Dei.  (c)  Good  works 
are  indications  or  proofs  of  gratitude,  and  also  a  confession. 

(d)  Good  works  are  necessary  in  order  to  the  practice  of  faith. 

(e)  Good  works  serve  to  strengthen  the  certainty  of  redemption 
(v.  the  Apology  to  the  Augsburg  Confession). 


232      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Note  to  §116:1 

1.  An  interesting  topic  for  investigation  is  the  history  of  the  Pro- 
testant controversy  concerning  faith  and  good  works.     A  generation 
or  two  after  the  Reformation  proper,  faith  was  defined  not  as  trust, 
but  as  assent  to  doctrine  on  the  basis  of  proof  or  of  authority.     When 
faith  was  so  defined,  and  yet  faith  was  made  the  necessary  precondi- 
tion of  good  works,  there  naturally  ensued  the  reaction  of  rationalism 
and  ethicalism,  culminating  in  the  religionless  morality  of  the  modern 
ethical  culture  movement.     Under  the  pressure  of  experience  at  first, 
since  good  men  were  found  to  differ  in  doctrine,  a  distinction  was 
made  between  fundamental  and  non-fundamental  doctrines.     Biblical 
doctrines  were  regarded  as  fundamental.     But  Biblical  criticism  has 
undermined  this  distinction.     But  is  there  no  connection  between 
faith  and  character?     A  moral-less  faith  developed,  and  then  by  reac- 
tion a  faithless  morality.     Both  are  wrong. 

2.  If  we  seek  for  the  living  point  of  unity  in  these  different 
thoughts,  we  shall  find  it  in  what  the  trust  in  Jesus  on  the  part 
of  publicans  and  sinners  saved  by  him  included  and  includes 
to-day  still.     One  side  of  that  trust  is  the  awakened  conscious- 
ness of  one's  own  guilt  and  neediness.     We  have  in  this,  how- 
ever, only  the  indispensable  presupposition  of  the  new  life, 
but  not  its  direct  object.     The  latter  is  rather  to  be  sought  in 
the  Christ-awakened  faith  in  forgiveness  and  justification  it- 
self, i.  e.  in  the  joyous  conviction  that  through  God's  love  in 
Jesus  Christ  we  are  admitted  into  fellowship  with  the  holy  God, 
and  into  his  kingdom.     But  this  certainly  includes  (a)  the  liv- 
ing impulse  to  the  religious  and  moral  life  required  by  Jesus, 
and  this  is  a  direct  positive  impulse  to  the  activity  of  faith  in 
the  world,  therefore  to  the  practice  of  the  love  of  God  and  of 
the  neighbor  in  the  sense  of  §112.  This  is  grounded  in  the  con- 
tent of  faith  in  God,  who  wills  to  actualize  his  kingdom  through 
faith  in  Christ,  but  also  (b)  in  the  character  of  faith  which 
strives  to  become  experience  itself,  and  which  is  thus  destined 
to  a  testing  here  in  the  world.1     At  the  same  time  justifying 
faith  has  the  power  to  practice  the  will  of  God.     (a)   Our  inner 
contradiction  to  the  will  of  God  gives  way  to  the  free  and  joy- 
ous conviction  that  God's  love,  which  we  have  in  Christ,  draws 
us  to  himself,  even  in  his  commandments  also.     (/8)   Moreover 
the  allurement  of  the  goods  of  this  world  is  broken  through 
faith  in  the  Crucified  One,2  and  the  paralyzing  fear  before  the 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     233 

outer  world  and  the  untoward  results  which  the  fulfilments  of 
the  divine  commandment  can  bring  are  overcome  through  the 
faith  that  this  world  also  must  serve  the  will  of  God  and  those 
who  do  the  will  of  God. 
Notes  to  §116 :  2 

1.  Both  liberals  and  the  orthodox  to-day  are  preaching  salvation  by 
character.     Is  it  salvation  by  character,  or  character  by  salvation,  or 
are  both  one-sided  ?     There  is  no  salvation  apart  from  character.     But 
all  in  all  in  the  long  run  is  there  any  character  apart  from  salvation? 
No,  not  apart  from  the  processes  by  which  we  pass  on  from  nature- 
beings  to  become  spiritual   beings.     Character   is   achieved   in   and 
through  salvation.     The  two  are  obverse  sides  of  one  and  the  same 
thing. 

2.  There  is  nothing  in  history  so  able  to  keep  this  world's  empty 
glory  from  costing  us  too  dear,  as  the  cross  of  Christ. 

3.  This  analysis  of  the  motive  implicit  in  faith  releases  a 
series  of  problems  (a)  First,  the  question  propounded  in  §115: 
3,  4,  as  to  the  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit.     Is  this  work  mediated 
through  word  and  sacrament,  as  even  Protestantism  has  his- 
torically maintained  for  the  most  part?     The  facts  involved 
would  seem  to  require  us  to  hold  both  to  psychological  and  to 
historical  mediations  and  to  a  new  birth  effected  by  God  him- 
self,    (b)   There   are   also   the   questions   raised    in    §111:4, 
§112:2,  3,  §113:4  and  intensified  by  §114:2.     How  can  an 
inner  fulfilment  of  the  law  of  God  take  place  in  sinful  hu- 
manity ?     This  question  is  also  answered  by  the  foregoing,      (c) 
The  formulae  in  No.  1  above,  concerning  faith  and  the  con- 
nection between  faith  and  good  works,  find  their  unitary  con- 
nection and  internalization.     It  is  in  faith  itself  that  Christ's 
spirit  (la,  above)  and  the  impression  of  God's  perfect  will 
(1  b,  above)  become  powerful  in  us;  also,  along  with  this,  grate- 
ful joy  (1  c,  above)  over  the  calling  to  be  co-workers  in  God's 
work   (Id,  above),  inner  impulse  to  prove  faith,  and   (1  e, 
above)  thereby  experience  the  reality  of  what  is  believed,     (d) 
Some  solution  of  the  old  controversy  is  reached,  viz.  whether 
good  works  are  necessary  to  salvation  (opera  bona  necessaria 
ad  salutcm}.     Good  works  do  not  serve  in  order  to  the  acquire- 
ment of  salvation  and  of  eternal  blessedness,  but  the  verifica- 
tion of  faith  in  and  through  good  works  is  necessary  to  the 
preservation  of  blessed  fellowship  with  God  received  in  faith, 


234     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

This  in  the  new  form  is  the  problem  of  the  relation  between 
salvation  and  character,  and  the  old  problem  of  faith  and  good 
works  is  in  its  new  form  the  problem  of  the  relation  of  religion 
and  morality. 

4.  In  this  conception  of  the  work  of  the  Spirit  justice  is 
done  both  to  God's  grace  and  to  human  freedom,  (a)  We  are 
conscious  that  the  origin  of  our  faith  is  being  inwardly  appre- 
hended by  Christ,  and  that  in  the  progress  of  faith  in  inner 
receptivity  we  are  still  face  to  face  with  Christ.  We  are  also 
aware  that  the  outer  guidance  or  providence  of  life  by  which 
we  were  led  to  Christ  was  not  our  work,  and  should  be  put 
under  the  category  of  the  grace  of  God.  (b)  But  we  are  not 
less  conscious  of  our  own  responsibility  to  surrender  ourselves 
to  the  spirit  of  Christ  and  to  let  ourselves  be  educated  by  him, 
also  to  utilize  the  outer  guidance  or  providence  of  God  on  our 
behalf.  This  guidance  of  God,  or  providence,  is  the  truth  in 
religious  determinism. 

§117.  Methodic  Conclusions  for  Further  Treatment  and  Di- 
vision of  Christian  Ethics. 

1.  From  our  knowledge  of  the  foundation  of  the  Christian 
life,  of  its  basis  and  beginning,  we  gain  the  following  methodic 
conclusions,      (a)   In  philosophic  ethics  the  opposition  between 
Kant  and  Schleiermacher  led  to  the  controversy  as  to  whether 
an  imperative  or  a  descriptive  treatment  of  ethics  was  the  true 
one.     The  conclusion  as  regards  Christian  ethics  was  that  it 
had  to  describe  what  motives  are  given  in  faith  in  Jesus  Christ, 
or  what  effects  issued  from  Jesus  Christ.     But  since  the  latter 
are  operative  not  as  natural  forces  but  as  ethical  motives,  the 
character  of  the  Christian  norm  of  life  as  supreme  "  ought " 
remains  in  validity,  and  thus  an  imperative  treatment  of  ethics 
is  required  also,     (b)   Within  Christian  ethics  the  question  as 
to  the  relation  between  social  and  individual  ethics  was  pro- 
pounded.    From  the  concept  of  "  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ  " 
it  follows  that  both  are  equally  indispensable  in  Christian  ethics. 
Yet  it  would  seem  that  precedence  belongs  to  individual  ethics, 
since  only  in  personal  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  do  the  motives  im- 
portant for  the  community  life  enter  into  effect. 

2.  In  the  following  we  treat  first  (B)  the  Christian  forma- 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     235 

tion,  or  construction,  of  the  human  personal  life,  i.  e.  individ- 
ual ethics;  secondly,  (C)  the  Christian  formation  of  the  hu- 
man social  life,  i.  e.  social  ethics. 


B.  THE  CHRISTIAN  FORMATION  OF  THE  HUMAN  PER- 
SONAL LIFE,  OR  INDIVIDUAL  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS 

a.  THE  CHRISTIAN  PERSONALITY  AS  GRADUALLY  BECOMING. 

§118.  The  Idea  of  Conversion  in  Relation  to  the  Temporal  De- 
velopment of  the  Christian  Life. 

1.  When  we  investigate  the  renewal  of  the  personal  life  aris- 
ing from  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  we  meet  with  the  idea  of  con- 
version, or  repentance,      (a)   Ecclesiastical  doctrine  has  ever 
fluctuated  concerning  the  relation  of  conversion  to  regeneration, 
(b)   Even  the  New  Testament  does  not  present  a  logical  defini- 
tion of  the  expressions  i-maTptfaiv  (conversion)  and  /xeravoelv  (re- 
pentance),     (c)  But  the  history  of  the  idea  of  conversion  gives 
us  the  right  to  define  it  in  its  relation  to  the  idea  of  regenera- 
tion.    The  two  ideas  designate  a  transition  in  the  life  of  a  per- 
son who  is  upborne  by  religious  faith.     The  idea  of  regenera- 
tion designates  the  transition  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
creative  divine  causation  or  efficiency.     The  idea  of  conversion 
designates  the  transition  from  the  point  of  view  of  changed 
human  relations.     Two  other  intimately  related  questions  are 
connected  with  these  two,  viz.  (a)  whether  this  transition  is  to 
be  defined  as  a  single  instantaneous  turning-point  in  life,  and 
(b)  whether  it  is  to  be  defined  as  one  that  is  homogeneous  in 
all  Christians. 

2.  In  the  first  of  these  two  questions  the  New  Testament 
reckons  naturally  everywhere  with  the  decisive  transition  from 
paganism  and  Judaism  to  Christian  faith.     But  the  preaching 
of  Jesus  and  the  relations  of  the  New  Testament  communities 
lead  us  to  see  that  a  repetition  of  «rioT/oe'<£eiv  and  t^ravodv  is  neces- 
sary.    The  relations  of  present  Christianity  are  such  that  a 
turning-point  may  arise  capable  of  being  temporarily  fixed. 
But  such  a  phenomenon  is  not  necessary  and  normal  under  all 
circumstances.     In  either  case  no  miraculous  transformation 
needs  to  be  assumed,  but  only  the  formation  of  the  Christian 


236      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

life  in  continuous  turning  to  God  and  turning  away  from  the 
world. 

3.  As  to  the  second  of  those  questions,  conversion  is  by  no 
means  uniform  with  all.     There  is  the  difference  between  tem- 
poral development  and  the  character  of  the  starting-point.     Yet 
there  is  a  general  similarity  in  the  conversion  of  all  true  Chris- 
tians, and  this  consists  in  becoming  persons  reconciled  with  God 
and  sanctified  (made  holy)  by  God,  instead  of  remaining  na- 
ture-beings in  mere  nature-relations  and  processes. 

4.  This   distinction  between  the  two  questions  is   directed 
against  the  attempts  to  regulate  conversions  according  to  defi- 
nite methods.1     Experientially  such  regulated  conversions  lead 
to  evil.     There  are  several  dangers  connected  with  this  revival- 
ism.    These  dangers  are  the  following:     (a)   Mere  natural  ex- 
citement ;  2  (b)  the  absence  of  self-dependence  over  against  the 
movement  of  the  mass,  or  of  the  organization,  or  of  some  mas- 
terful personality;    (c)    therefore  the  evil  of  a  recoil   subse- 
quently, and  the  evil  of  making  religion  mechanical,     (d)  All 
this  may  become  an  encroachment,  an  irruption  into  God's  order 
and  into  the  right  of  free  personality,  at  least  where  it  is  in- 
tentionally sought. 

Notes  to  §118 :  4 

1.  People  want  to  dictate,  pre-determine  and  legislate  as  to  how  it 
is  to  be  done. 

2.  Through  stentorian  preaching  and  realistic  pictures  of  an  escha- 
tological  character,  the  excitement  produced  has  sometimes  been  ter- 
rible. 

5.  On  the  whole  the  Christian  life  presents  itself  to  us  as 
one  that  gradually  becomes.     This  becoming  of  Christian  per- 
sonality is  effectuated  (a)  as  a  continuous  organization  of  the 
energies  of  the  natural  life  into  the  Christian  direction  of  life ;  * 
(b)  as  a  continuous  warfare  against  the  power  of  sin  persisting 
in  us. 

Note  to  §118 :  5 

1.  This  is  of  far  more  importance  than  questions  of  the  Trinity, 
etc.  This  commonplace  has  not  been  given  its  proper  place  in  preach- 
ing in  this  country. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  .ETHICS     237 

§119.  The  Character  of  True  Repentance. 

1.  In  the  concept  of  conversion  the  negative  side  of  turning 
from  the  anti-divine  and  anti-ethical  direction  of  life  is  essen- 
tial, along  with  the  positive  side  of  turning  toward  God.     We 
may  designate  the  former  as  repentance  in  the  narrower  sense, 
or  as  turning  away  from  sin,  and  to  use  this  designation  is  to 
be  in  harmony  with  the  main  side  of  the  New  Testament  con- 
cept of  fi*Tdvota}  and  with  the  later  development  of  ecclesiastical 
usage. 

2.  During  the  Eeformation  the  question  of  the  correct  mo- 
tivation of  repentance  arose.     The  Reformers  held  on  the  one 
hand  that  contritio  in  the  sense  of  the  terrores  incussi  con- 
scientiae  is  effected  by  the  law;  on  the  other  hand  that  the  vera 
contritio  first  comes  through  faith  in  the  gospel     The  two  theses 
are  not  necessarily  contradictory,  but  present  an  historical  and 
a  systematic  problem. 

3.  As  to  the  historical  appreciation,  the  personal  experience 
of  the  Reformers  affords  full  explanation  of  the  coexistence  of 
the  two  series  of  thoughts  in  the  first  period  of  the  Reforma- 
tion ;  but  at  the  same  time  it  is  intelligible  from  the  experiences 
of  the  church  visitation  and  antinomian  controversies  that  the 
first  series  of  thoughts,  viz.  contrition  effected  by  the  law,  was 
pushed  into  the  foreground. 

4.  The  systematic  judgment  in  view  of  the  relation  of  Jesus 
Christ  himself  to  the  sinner  and  the  full  unity  of  the  gospel 
of  Christ,  must  emphasize  the  second  side,  viz.  that  only  faith 
in  Jesus  Christ,  the  Crucified,  can  awaken  sincere  Christian 
repentance.     A*    law-repentance    antecedent    or    prevenient    to 
faith  is  possible,  but  it  is  not  yet  true  Christian  repentance,  and 
is  not  to  be  set  up  as  norm  either  for  the  genesis  or  the  growth 
of  the  Christian  life. 

5.  From  the  connection  between  repentance  and  faith  the 
following  is  clear:  (a)  the  normal  content  of  repentance  in  the 
case  of  all  Christians,  viz.   knowledge  or  recognition  of  sin, 
suffering  over  sin,  confession  to  God  and  it  may  be  to  men 
eventually,  and  purpose  of  improvement;  1   (b)  the  prolonga- 
tion of  repentance  through  the  whole  Christian  life.2 


238      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Notes  to  §119  :  5 

1.  Topic  for  investigation:  The  relation  between  forgiveness  and 
improvement.  It  is  necessary  that  forgiveness  should  have  its  fruit- 
age in  improvement ;  the  forgiven  prodigal  must  not  return  to  his  evil 
•ways.  What  must  be  done  to  save  the  moral  life  from  the  paralysis 
that  may  come  to  it  from  forgiveness?  Few  things  are  more  urgent 
than  a  consideration  of  this  question. 

There  is  something  confused  and  superficial  and  unsatisfying  about 
the  notion  of  forgiveness  of  sin.  What  is  it  for  God  to  forgive  sin,  in 
view  of  the  inviolability  of  law?  If  anything  is  a  reality  in  this 
world  it  is  punishment  for  the  violation  of  law,  even  when  the  viola- 
tion is  unintentional.  "  God  never  speaks,"  said  Emerson.  If  this  is 
so,  then  forgiveness  and  improvement  are  two  sides  of  the  same  thing. 
Split  a  cell,  and  the  first  thing  it  does  is  to  regenerate  itself.  Is  it 
something  like  that  in  the  moral  realm  that  forgiveness  is?  Is  it 
something  so  ontological  and  law-abiding? 

2.  Thus  repentance  is  like  prayer,  which  is  not  an  act  but  a  char- 
acter, not  an  episode  but  a  life. 

The  good  of  revival  is  that  it  starts  with  an  initial  act  of  repentance. 
The  evil  of  revival  is  that  it  often  stops  there. 

§120.  The  Problem  of  Christian  Perfection. 

1.  The  prolongation  of  conversion  and  repentance  through- 
out the  whole  Christian  life,  according  to  §§118,  119  above, 
would  seem  to  exclude  the  application  of  the  idea  of  perfection 
to  the  Christian.     Yet  the  New  Testament,  as  well  as  Prot- 
estant usage,  makes  the  idea  of  perfection  a  problem  for  us. 

2.  In  opposition  to  the  Catholic  thought  of  a  perfectio  evan- 
gelica  which  was  sought  in  the  monastic  life,  the  Reformers 
affirmed  that  true  perfectio  consisted  in  having  and  exercising 
faith  and  love  within  the  daily  life.     This  thesis  means  that 
life  in  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ  is  perfect  in  kind,  i.  e.  is  quali- 
tatively perfect.     Thus  understood  this  doctrine  has  its  good 
right  according  to  the  whole  standpoint  of  the  New  Testament, 
and  in  the  employment  of  the  idea  of  TC'A«O«  ("  perfect  ")  in 
single  passages. 

3.  As  to  the  state  of  the  single  Christian,  (a)  it  is  thus  said 
that  he  is  led  into  this  perfect  life  by  means  of  the  work  of  the 
Spirit  of  God.      (b)  But  it  is  also  true  that  the  Christian's 
appropriation  of  this  spiritual  life  is  ever  incomplete ;  therefore 
he  sees  the  TeAeiojTT/s  (perfection)  in  this  sense  ever  before  him 
as  a  goal  not  yet  attained. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     239 

4.  In  this  way  we  arrive  at  the  idea  of  stages  of  Christian 
development.1  (a)  One  stage  of  the  Christian  life,  especially 
of  Christian  knowledge  attainable  in  the  earthly  life,  or  actually 
attained,  is  designated  by  the  concept  TeAetos.  (b)  But  this 
employment  of  the  concept  may  not  lead  us  to  mark  off  the 
single  stages  of  the  Christian  life  from  its  beginning  on  to  the 
stage  of  perfection  by  empirical  characteristics,  and  to  dis- 
tribute the  individual  Christians  along  these  stages.  Rather 
the  gradual  progress  and  various  tendencies  of  the  Christian 
life  are  to  be  determined  only  in  humble  self-examination  and 
self-valuation  in  the  presence  of  God,  and  to  be  recognized  as 
task  that  can  end  only  in  eternal  perfection. 

Note  to  §120 :  4 

1.  The  Christian  life  is  not  a  ready-made  finished  product,  which 
we  go  and  get  as  something  given  to  us.  There  is  an  activity-moment 
in  our  growth.  Our  life  is  not  simply  a  gift,  but  a  task;  it  is  not  a 
possession,  but  a  product;  not  a  finality,  but  a  movement.  But  it  is 
not  so  much  a  task  as  to  make  it  necessary  that  we  do  it  in  dissocia- 
tion from  the  great  work  of  God.  The  word  "  growth  "  consistently 
worked  out  would  cover  what  is  essential  in  the  thought  of  sanctifica- 
tion.  (We  may  soon  need  a  glossary  for  such  words  as  "sanctifica- 
tion.") 

b.  THE  GROWTH  OR  BECOMING  OF  PERSONALITY  IN  THE  DO- 
ING OF  DUTY  AND  THE  FULFILMENT  OF  VOCATION. 

§121.  The  Idea  of  Duty  and  the  Validity  of  this  Idea  for  the 
Christian  Life. 

1.  Christian  ethics  has  always  subsumed  the  life  of  Chris- 
tian personality  under  the  two  formal  concepts  of  duty  and 
virtue,  taken  over  from  antique  ethics.     The  concept  of  duty 
is  intimately  connected  with  that  of  law. 

2.  To  be  sure  the  application  of  the  idea  of  law  to  the  Chris- 
tian region  is  in  general  justified  (v.  §104:  4,  §111 :  3,  §117: 1, 
a).     Kant  defined  the  dutiful  act  as  an  act  performed  out  of 
regard   for   the  unconditioned   law;   but   the   question    arises 
whether  this  idea  of  duty  pertains  to  the  life  of  the  individual 
Christian,  which  is  a  life  in  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 
therefore  in  freedom,  and  how  the  one  (duty)   is  compatible 
with  the  other  (spirit  and  freedom). 


240      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

3.  On  the  soil  of  the  Eeformation  this  problem  was  already 
felt  and  was  elucidated  in  doctrinal  controversies  over  the 
question  as  to  the  validity  of  the  law  for  the  regenerated  also 
(the  Antinomian  controversy).1  (a)  The  decision  of  eccle- 
siastical doctrine  was  as  follows:  the  Christian  secundum  in- 
teriorem  hominem  is  free  from  the  curse  and  compulsion  of 
the  law,  but  yet  lives  in  lege  Dei;  but  on  the  other  hand  the 
Christian  needs  the  lex  scripta  with  its  threatening  and  punish- 
ment, because  the  "  old  man  "  still  lives  in  him.  (b)  But  in 
this  way  a  unitary  norm  of  the  Christian  life  is  not  attained. 
There  is  simply  an  unhealthy  oscillation  between  the  stand- 
point of  the  old  man  and  that  of  the  new  man  which  works 
out  very  badly. 

Note  to  §121 : 3 

1.  Antinomianism  was  a  greater  foe  to  the  Reformation  than  the 
Peasants'  War.  It  maintained  that  law  (duty)  was  not  in  force  for 
the  regenerate,  but  only  for  the  sinner.  The  inner  life  was  not  yet 
in  its  freedom  mature  and  strong,  so  that  its  freedom  could  be  moral 
through  and  through. 

4.  Instead  of  all  this  it  must  be  clearly  urged  that  on  the 
one  hand  the  validity  of  the  statutory  external  law  (lex 
scripta)  is  entirely  done  away  with  on  New  Testament  soil, 
even  as  regards  the  old  man ;  that  on  the  other  hand  the  Chris- 
tian knows  that  he  is  under  the  unconditioned  "  ought  "  of  the 
will  of  God,  even  secundum.  interiorem  hominem,  not  only  so 
far  as  he  is  still  sinful,  but  so  far  as  he  is  a  man  and  a  struggler 
with  sin.  Thus  not  only  Paul  knows  that  he  is  bound  by  a  new 
law  in  spite  of  his  liberation  from  the  Old  Testament  law,  but 
even  Christ  himself  during  his  earthly  life  put  himself  under 
the  "  must  "  of  the  divine  will  which  he  fulfilled  in  holy  rever- 
ence.1 But  the  idea  of  duty  in  this  way  retains  its  power  for 
the  Christian  life,  for  duty  is  the  obligation  of  a  single  subject 
to  fulfil  an  unconditioned  law  or  a  single  commandment  neces- 
sarily derivable  from  that  law. 

Note  to  §121 : 4 

1.  There  are  those  to-day  who  are  prostituting  freedom.  They 
stand  for  an  atomistic  freedom  which  is  neither  cause  nor  effect  of 
character,  a  sub-ethical  freedom,  untrue  to  philosophy  and  injurious  to 
practical  life.  Freedom  with  content  costs  the  sweat  and  blood  of  a 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     241 

Gethsemane-struggle ;  but  these  people  bandy  the  word  about  with 
people  who  are  a  menace  to  society. 

5.  In  the  midst  of  the  consciousness  of  duty  the  Christian  can 
and  ought  to  exemplify  his  freedom  (a)  through  the  self-de- 
pendent recognition  of  the  divine  will,  and  (b)  the  self-depend- 
ent derivation  of  his  special  duties  from  the  universal  laws  of 
God,  and  (c)  through  joy  in  doing  what  he  does  according  to 
the  will  of  God. 

§122.  Vocation, 

1.  The  idea  of  vocation  or  calling  is  intimately  connected 
with  that  of  duty,  (a)  This  idea  of  vocation  itself  grows  out 
of  the  idea  of  duty  with  inner  necessity,  for  the  derivation  of 
our  special  duties  from  the  universal  law  of  God  (§121:5) 
we  cannot  effectuate  from  case  to  case,  but  we  must  mark  off 
a  circle  of  duties  to  be  done  as.  the  region  of  our  religio-ethical 
activity,  i.  e.  as  our  vocation,  (b)  According  to  Christian 
standards  and  in  the  long  run  this  vocation  cannot  be  that  of 
self-culture  simply,  but  it  must  somehow  serve  the  character  of 
a  Suucovia  ("service")  in  social  relations  established  according 
to  God's  order.1  (c)  Since  we  are  placed  simultaneously  in 
different  circles  of  human  society  the  entire  calling  of  life,  i.  e. 
vocation  in  the  wider  sense,  is  made  up  of  the  different  circles 
of  duty,  but  our  life  calling  becomes  a  unity  when  one  duty- 
group  is  erected  to  the  dignity  of  our  real  task  in  life  {vocation 
in  the  narrower  sense},  (d)  There  is  no  expression  in  the 
New  Testament  which  quite  corresponds  to  this  idea  of  "  call- 
ing," but  the  thing  is  there,  and  is  there  especially  in  the  life 
of  Jesus  himself.2 

Notes  to  §122  : 1 

1.  Self-culture  as  an  ideal  ends  in  a  refined  epicureanism  or  in  a 
pessimistic  stoicism,  and  the  thing  it  wants  to  do  is  the  very  thing  it 
does  not  do.     Service  is  the  way  to  culture,  though  culture  is  also  a 
means  to  service. 

2.  In  New  Testament  times  they  did  not  realize  the  need  of  a  call- 
ing. 

2.  The  worth  of  vocation  is  clear  from  the  derivation  of  the 
concept  as  given  above.  On  the  one  hand  vocation  has  social 


242      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

worth  as  joint  labor  at  the  actualization  of  the  moral  fellow- 
ship of  men  and  therewith  of  the  kingdom  of  God  ultimately. 
On  the  other  hand  it  has  individual  worth  as  a  field  for  the 
acquirement  of  religio-ethical  perfection  and  thus  for  the  ful- 
filment of  our  eternal  vocation  (i.  e.  the  originating  and  matur- 
ing of  personality). 

3.  From  this  two-fold  worth  of  vocation  there  follows  a  two- 
fold standard  to  be  applied  to  the  multiplicity  of  vocations 
which  have  been  formed   in   the   history   of  human   society. 
Measured  by  this  standard  many  callings  must  be  adjudged 
from  the  social  point  of  view  as  injurious  or  worthless  or  doubt- 
ful, and  from  the  individual  point  of  view  as  ruinous  to  the 
soul  or  dangerous  or  grievous.1 

Note  to  §122 :  3 

1.  Does  our  vocation  function  serviceably  for  society  ?  What  is  the 
degree  of  its  serviceability?  Does  it  promote  the  religio-ethical  de- 
velopment of  the  individual  who  follows  it?  May  there  be  a  calling 
which  promotes  society's  welfare  but  which  injures  the  individual  who 
fulfils  the  calling?  May  a  calling  that  promotes  the  growth  of  the  in- 
dividual work  injury  to  society? 

4.  On  the  basis  of  the  Christian  conception  of  calling  the 
following  may  be  said:     (a)   Certain  principles  at  least  should 
be  regulative  in  the  choice  of  a  vocation.     Each  one  should 
enter  upon  the  vocation  in  which  presumably  or  prospectively 
he  will  be  able  to  employ  his  gifts  most  certainly  and  most 
fruitfully  for  the  common  weal,  and  from  which  he  yet  does 
not  need  to  fear  danger  to  his  ethico-religious  personality,     (b) 
There  are  universally  valid  norms  of  a  moral  kind  and  of  reli- 
gious content  applicable  to  the  fulfilment  of  vocation.     Those 
of  a  moral  kind  are,  for  example,  acquiring  an  independence 
and  civil  validity,  rights  and  equality,  also  fidelity  to  those  who 
are  dependent  upon  us,  and  ministering  love.     Those  of  a  reli- 
gious kind  are,  for  example,  matters  pertaining  to  the  house- 
hold of  faith,  to  church  and  to  worship. 

§123.  The  Self-dependence  of  Moral  Personality  on  the 
Basis  of  Vocation,  or  the  Question  of  the  Collision  of 
Duties. 

1.  A  large  number  of  single  duties  are  definitely  mapped  out 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     243 

and  appointed  to  every  one  who  has  taken  up  a  fixed  calling 
so  that  he  can  exemplify  his  freedom  only  within  the  recogni- 
tion of  their  limits.  But  there  ever  remains,  especially  in  the 
higher  callings  most  of  all,  a  region  in  which  the  individual 
must  decide  on  his  own  responsibility  what  is  duty  for  him. 
This  self-dependent  responsibility  must  not  be  withdrawn  from 
the  Christian,  or  abridged  —  not  even  by  ecclesiastical  author- 
ity, e.  g.  by  the  Confessional,  or  by  what  is  called  "  probabil- 
ism."  1 

Note  to  §123 : 1 

1.  Probabilism  is  the  doctrine  that  of  two  ecclesiastically  permis- 
sible courses  of  action,  you  may  take  that  one  which  accords  with  your 
inclination.     Here  we  have  ecclesiastical  authority  taking  the  decision 
out  of  the  realm  of  conscience  and  lodging  it  in  the  inclinations. 
(See  Herrmann :  Faith  and  Morals).     It  is  giving  up  the  moral  auton- 
omy of  the  human  person  for  an  infra-personal  heteronomy. 

2.  This  holds  good  for  the  so-called  collision  of  duties,  or 
more  accurately,  for  the  collision  of  moral  interests,  i.  e.  for 
cases  in  which  within  our  calling  in  the  wider  sense  there  are 
simultaneous  different  requirements,  only  the  one  or  the  other 
of  which  we  can  fulfil.     For  such  casus  conscientiae  no  casuistic 
rules  can  be  given  once  for  all.     The  conscience  of  each  one 
must  decide  as  to  individual  relations.     The  main  questions 
to  be  considered  are  the  following:     (a)  Which  deed  is  most 
intimately  connected  with  my  calling  in  the  narrower  sense  ? 
(b)   Which  deed  yields  the  most  fruitful  service  for  my  fellow- 
man?     (c)   Which   deed   requires  my   initiative?     (That   is, 
Which  deed  must  be  done  by  me  if  it  is  to  be  done  at  all  ?) 

3.  Not  only  in  various  duty  circles  which  form  vocation  in 
the  narrower  sense,  but  also  outside  of  these  circles  the  re- 
quirements of  beneficence  may  press  upon  us  with  special  urg- 
ency (charity,  doing  good).     But  the  decision  concerning  these 
extraordinary  duties  of  love  is  individual  also.     We  may  and 
ought  to  do  them,  as  under  the  existing  circumstances  we  are 
"  neighbors  "  to  the  end  of  satisfying  these  needs,  provided  we 
do  not  omit  more  important  tasks  of  life  thereby ;  but  from  this 
point  of  view  these  deeds  of  love  come  under  the  head  of  dutiful 
deeds. 


244     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

§124.  The  Question  of  a  Super-Dutiful  and  a  Sub-Dutiful  Act. 

1.  The  idea  of  "  works  of  supererogation  "  (opera  superero- 
gatoria)  is  to  be  rejected  not  only  in  the  cases  mentioned  in 
§123 :  3   above,   but   in   all   other  cases   whatever.     The   idea 
springs  from  "the  application  of  legal  points  of  view  such  as 
underlie  the  Catholic  distinction  of  "required"   (praecepta) 
and  "advised"  (consilia).     The  evangelical  understanding  of 
the  law  as  a  law  of  freedom  does  not  permit  the  assumption  of 
a  superdutiful  deed. 

2.  But  at  the  same  time  we  have  with  this  the  problem  of  a 
sub-dutiful  deed,     (a)   The  question  is  whether  there  is  not  a 
region  of  the  permissible,  of  the  ethically  indifferent,  even  in 
the  Christian  life,  alongside  of  the  region  of  vocation-duties  and 
the  extraordinary  duties  of  love  referred  to  in  §123  (b).     His- 
torically this  subject  has  been  designated  ethical  adiaphora  (in- 
difference).    In  the  history  of  the  evangelical  church  this  ques- 
tion, already  emerging  in  the  New  Testament  indeed,  was  hotly 
discussed  in  the  adiaphoristic  controversies.     In  modern  scien- 
tific ethics  it  is  treated  as  the  problem  of  the  permissible,     (c) 
In  answering  the  question  three  regions  of  activity  come  into 
consideration. 

3.  For  the  first,  those  activities  which  come  under  the  head 
of  recreation  (or  amusement)  occupy  a  special  position,     (a) 
They  all  have  the  character  of  a  free  engagement  or  expression 
of  our  energies  in  play,     (b)  But  just  on  that  account  they 
are  withdrawn  from  direct  subsumption  under  the  concept  of 
duty,     (c)  But  of  course  they  are  for  all  that  indirectly  regu- 
lated by  that  concept  and  limited  by  that  concept  in  reference 
to  scope,  content,  and  personal  relation. 

4.  For  the  second,  we  have  to  do  with  decisions  connected 
with  our  vocation  in  the  narrow  sense  of  that  word,  and  with 
our  personal  relations  in  life,  e.  g.  society,  friendship,  and  the 
like.     Frequently  the  duty-judgment  does  not  lead  to  an  all- 
around  determination,  but  to  one  point  from  which  the  ulti- 
mate decision  may  and  must  be  made  in  accord  with  inclination 
and  natural  impulse.     But  this  decision  too  is  surrounded  with 
inviolable  limits  by  the  duty-judgment. 

5.  For  the  third,  the  functions  of  the  natural,  so  far  as  they 
are  dependent  upon  the  will,  may  not  be  brought  directly  under 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     245 

the  duty-concept  in  all  particulars,  but  are  subject  to  only  an 
indirect  regulation  by  that  concept  as  to  scope;  eventually  as 
to  content  and  relationship. 

6.  On  the  basis  of  this  evaluation  of  these  single  regions  the 
following  decision  may  be  arrived  at:  (a)  Concerning  the 
idea  of  the  permissible:  There  is  a  permissible  deed  in  the 
sense  of  a  deed  regulated  not  directly  but  only  indirectly  by 
the  idea  of  duty,  (b)  Concerning  the  idea  of  ethical  adi- 
aphora:  (a)  There  are  no  morally  indifferent  deeds,  for  even 
the  region  which  is  not  directly  subject  to  the  duty-idea  is  yet 
indirectly  normed  by  it,  and  to  be  made  serviceable  to  the  moral 
life  as  a  whole,  (ft)  Also  there  are  no  indifferent  religious 
deeds,  for  even  those  religious  ceremonies  as  regards  which 
freedom  is  to  be  left  to  the  individual,  and  the  ecclesiastical 
community  can  decide  differently,  are  yet  subject  to  a  regula- 
tion through  the  end  of  "  edification  "  (oucoSo/n^).1 

Note  to  §124:  6 

1.  Modern  scientific  ethics  and  the  standpoint  of  Jesus  agree  on  this 
point. 

Is  there  any  ceremony,  rite,  or  institution,  which  can  be  justified 
save  only  so  far  as  it  serves  a  moral  end  ?  Are  there  two  kinds  of  con- 
duct, two  kinds  of  duties,  the  one  religious  and  the  other  moral! 
Have  we  any  duty  to  God  which  lies  outside  of  our  duty  to  humanity  ? 
Or  must  religious  conduct  be  brought  under  the  head  of  moral  con- 
duct? It  is  not  taught  that  the  moral  serviceability  of  religious  rites 
is  their  sole  justification,  but  simply  that  it  is  their  import  for  moral- 
ity that  gives  them  their  importance  for  religion.  If  they  serve  an 
important  end,  they  are  religiously  as  well  as  morally  obligatory. 

Matthew  Arnold  defines  religion  as  morality  touched  with  emotion. 
But  Muirhead  points  out  that  all  conduct  is  touched  with  emotion; 
that  otherwise  it  would  not  be  conduct  at  all.  He  goes  on  to  maintain 
that  it  is  the  way  we  think  of  duty  which  makes  it  simply  moral,  or 
else  religious  also.  A  deed  done  with  reference  to  the  narrower  duties 
is  a  moral  deed.  The  same  deed  viewed  as  serving  the  ends  of  the 
cosmic  process  is  religious.  And  since  all  fully  good  conduct  has  ref- 
erence to  a  universal  end,  all  such  conduct  is  religious. 

Does  this  modern  view  of  the  world  and  of  human  conduct  (repre- 
sented by  Muirhead)  logically  land  us  in  a  religion  without  cult? 
Does  the  religious  sentiment  functionally  express  itself  in  cult,  or 
simply  in  moral  or  aesthetic  or  scientific  conduct?  Royce  has  some- 
thing to  say  on  this  subject,  and  he  is  worth  listening  to  still,  even 
if  the  pragmatists  are  after  him  with  a  sharp  stick.  In  his  Outlines 
of  Psychology  he  claims  that  in  the  attempt  to  cultivate  and  support 


246      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

religious  meditation  of  the  higher  type,  the  ritualist,  with  his  recogni- 
tion of  the  central  place  of  sensory  experiences  in  our  lives,  is  on  a 
better  psychological  basis  than  the  Puritan.  In  his  opinion  Puritan- 
ism, rejecting  ritual  as  a  confusing  or  corrupting  appeal  to  the  senses, 
has  tended  to  the  impoverishment  of  religious  experience.  (Royce  is 
a  member  of  no  church ;  will  take  none  of  their  obligations.  He  is  of 
the  opinion  that  only  philosophy  can  perform  the  service  which  re- 
ligion needs,  but  that  he  himself  can  do  this  work  better  outside  the 
church  than  in  it,  for  it  is  to  this  that  he  is  going  to  devote  himself  in 
the  future  [this  was  in  1905]). 

Is  what  Royce  says  of  the  religious  effect  of  Puritanism  true?  It 
is  true  that  Puritanism  would  eliminate  all  the  Catholic  appeals  to  the 
different  senses,  the  pictures  and  statues,  the  swinging  of  the  censer, 
the  perfume,  the  holy  water,  the  host,  the  music,  the  gorgeous  vest- 
ments, the  altar,  and  would  attach  itself  to  Paul,  who  held  that  noth- 
ing mattered  but  doing  the  will  of  God,  faith  touched  by  love,  and  a 
new  creature.  As  an  aid  to  worship,  the  presence  of  the  cult  is  the 
main  thing,  says  the  Catholic.  The  absence  of  the  cult  is  the  main 
thing,  says  the  Puritan. 

But  are  not  the  sermon  and  the  rational,  intellectual  reading  of  the 
Scriptures  specific  forms  of  the  expression  of  religion,  as  structurally 
as  the  church's  cult  is  ?  May  it  not  be  that  what  we  are  missing  in  the 
churches  is  an  organic  expression  of  the  religious  life,  rather  than  any 
particular  type  of  ritual  ?  It  is  getting  to  be  as  in  the  days  of  the  old 
English  deism  and  rationalism,  when  the  Greek  virtues  were  preached, 
but  specifically  religious  sermons  were  not  preached.  In  the  preach- 
ing of  to-day  the  moral  and  the  practical  have  been  substituted  for  the 
religious,  and  we  are  given  such  interesting  bits  of  information  as  that 
a  proof  of  immortality  is  likely  to  come  from  Professor  Hyslop's  re- 
searches. "  The  heart  is  restless  till  it  rests  in  Thee !  " —  where  is 
that  constitutive  and  regulative  in  preaching  to-day?  Spurgeon  and 
Alexander  Maclaren,  Robertson  and  Maurice  used  to  preach  religious 
sermons.  Let  us  bring  back  the  religious  sermon  and  perhaps  we  will 
get  back  religious  worship. 

Is  not  the  neglect  of  the  religious  in  the  interests  of  the  moral,  the 
substitution  of  the  moral  and  the  practical  for  the  religious,  a  part  of 
the  cause  of  the  immorality  in  our  American  life?  It  looks  as  if  the 
modern  man  had  not  at  his  disposal  the  stuff  which  makes  a  great  man. 
The  great  trouble  with  the  church  life  is  the  lack  of  religion;  we  talk 
all  around  the  trouble.  We  must  get  back  the  right  kind  of  sermon 
and  the  right  kind  of  hymn.  I  remember  my  great  grandfather's 
hyrnn-book  — "  The  Psalmist."  It  was  full  of  religious  hymns.  Has 
that  become  a  waste-product?  "Before  Jehovah's  awful  throne" — I 
wish  I  might  have  heard  Spurgeon  read  that  hymn  and  his  people  sing 
it  The  old  hymns  are  never  old;  you  might  as  well  speak  of  the  at- 
mosphere or  water  being  old.  Is  there  something  wrong  in  paying  a 
German  choir  to  sing,  "  Dis  is  der  day  der  Lord  has  made  "  ?  It  looks 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     247 

as  if  we  were  losing  the  inner  world,  losing  our  souls,  the  depth  and 
richness  of  the  life  of  the  spirit.  What  the  people  clamor  for  is  re- 
ligion, not  the  highly  trained  and  efficient  German  choir.  The  hunger 
of  man  as  man  is  for  the  life  and  love  and  companionship  of  the  Great 
Companion. 

Is  it  true  that  the  organic  externalization  of  the  religious  sentiment 
is  moral  conduct,  instead  of  cult?  Are  not  cult  and  dogma  and 
church  the  specific  and  structural  externalization  of  the  religious  sen- 
timent? The  artistic  sentiment  does  not  embody  itself  in  moral  con- 
duct as  such,  and  the  ethicist  makes  no  objection  to  that.  They  tell 
us  that  the  ritual  cult  of  the  worshipper  is  a  waste  of  energy.  But 
they  might  as  well  berate  the  tortoise  for  growing  his  shell;  because 
he  is  a  tortoise  that  is  what  he  does.  Would  not  the  patriotic  life 
suffer  abbreviation  without  the  flag  and  holidays  and  national  songs 
and  public  buildings  and  soldiers  marching?  So  cult  is  initially 
effect,  but  in  turn  it  comes  to  be  cause. 

This  cult-moment  in  religion  is  not  an  episode  in  the  history  of  re- 
ligion. It  is  more  organic  to  religion  than  either  dogma  or  institu- 
tion. The  burden  of  proof  is  with  the  man  who  says  cult  must  be 
eliminated.  It  will  change,  and  must  do  so,  but  it  will  not  disappear. 
This  reaction  against  a  fixed  cult  or  doctrine  or  church  is  going  too 
far.  Because  a  particular  worship  is  meaningless  or  bad,  away  with 
all  worship !  But  you  cannot  have  life  without  the  expression  of  life, 
and  through  the  expression  of  life  you  have  the  communication  and 
expansion  of  life. 

Must  doctrine  go  from  religion?  Is  religion  a  part  of  the  life  of 
man  in  which  thought  has  no  place  ?  I  attended  a  meeting  of  "  The 
Independent  Religious  Society."  The  speaker  was  bitter  and  hard. 
He  is  intense  and  honest  and  intelligent ;  but  his  address  was  an  attack 
upon  religion,  which  is  just  religious  speculation  according  to  him, 
and  he  undertook  to  show  that  morality  could  get  along  without  it. 
He  left  out  of  religion  emotion  and  volition,  and  considered  only  the 
intellectual  element.  He  identifies  religion  with  the  most  one-sided 
and  dangerous  of  its  externalizations,  and  then  damns  it  vigorously. 
He  was  educated  at  Princeton  Theological  Seminary,  where  doctrine 
is  held  to  be  more  important  than  life  in  religion.  There  is  the  foun- 
tain of  his  bitterness.  He  said  Swing's  independent  movement  died 
out,  and  wondered  if  his  would.  It  will.  He  does  not  permit  religion 
to  function  according  to  its  organs.  His  protest  is  legitimate  in  the 
main,  but  he  has  not  got  it  right,  and  it  will  not  live.  Religion  is  not 
intellectualism.  The  intellectual  output  of  religion  is  dogma;  its 
emotional  output  is  cult;  its  volitional  output,  the  church.  Religion 
becomes  sterile  if  not  allowed  to  function  in  all  of  these  ways. 


248      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 


c.  THE  BECOMING  OF  CHRISTIAN  PERSONALITY  AS  FORMATION 
OF  VIRTUE  AND  CHARACTER. 

a.  The  Concept  and  Main  Features  of  Christian  Character. 
§125.  Virtue  and  Virtues;  Character  and  Characters. 

1.  Along  with  the  idea  of  duty  that  of  virtue  is  applied  to 
the  Christian  life,  (a)  Already  in  ancient  ethics  "  virtue  " 
designated  the  permanent  character  of  the  will  (<&«),  which 
came  to  be  what  it  was  through  the  single  decisions  of  the  will, 
and  from  which  will  in  turn  the  single  decisions  proceeded. 
This  inter-relation  between  the  will  and  its  decisions  obtains 
in  modern  philosophical  ethics  as  well,  (b)  According  to 
Christian  ethics  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ  is  the  source  of  the 
right  fulfilment  of  the  divine  commandments.  But  on  the  basis 
of  the  surrender  of  faith  (Paul's  "  obedience  of  faith ")  to 
Jesus  Christ  and  of  conduct  in  his  spirit,  a  steadfast  direction 
of  the  will  to  the  end  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  well  as  a  cor- 
responding determinateness  of  the  ideational  and  emotional  life 
should  be  formed  in  the  Christian  himself,  (c)  This  founda- 
tion of  our  inner  life  to  steadfastness  of  Christian  willing  and 
thinking  and  feeling  is  possible  only  through  the  existence  of 
a  regularity  or  orderliness  in  psychical  processes  —  a  regularity 
in  no  sense  in  conflict  with  the  freedom  of  moral  decisions,  but 
a  regularity  which  manifests  itself  in  habit  (v.  §105 :  5,  b,  a).1 

Note  to  §125 : 1 

1.  Compare  the  Psalmist's  expression,  "  My  heart  is  fixed."     This 
fixedness  of  heart  is  not  simply  a  gift,  or  donation ;  it  is  a  task.     It  is 
not  a  mere  possession,  but  a  vocation. 

2.  According  to  1,  b  above,  Christian  virtue  is  at  bottom  only 
one;  it  is  unitary.     But  since  it  has  to  exemplify  itself  in  di- 
verse relations,  both  in  our  inner  and  our  outer  life,  we  may 
distinguish  different  sides  of  the  one  virtue;  the  one  virtue 
differentiates  and  specializes  into  many  virtues. 

3.  That  unity  is  designated  in  ethics  by  the  concept  "  char- 
acter."    This  is  especially  true  in  modern  ethics,      (a)   In  gen- 
eral this  word  "  character  "  designates  the  peculiar  direction 
and  connection  of  psychic  activities  acquired  through  conscious 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     249 

self-formation,  (b)  But  the  concept  "  character "  comes  to 
its  full  actualization  only  in  the  morally  good  character,  and 
that  is  the  Christian  character,  (c)  This  concept  of  character 
is  not  directly  contained  in  the  New  Testament,  and  yet  the 
thing  is  there  in  various  ways  ("Life  in  the  Spirit,"  "walk- 
ing in  the  Spirit,"  "  the  mind  of  the  Spirit,"  etc.). 

4.  To  be  sure,  Christian  character  in  its  fundamental  bent 
is  everywhere  the  same.  Yet  we  speak  of  a  variety,  a  many- 
ness  of  Christian  character.  It  is  not  simply  that  the  stages 
in  the  formation  of  the  Christian  character  are  various;  it  is 
also  that  the  types  of  which  character  is  capable  are  likewise 
many,  (a)  As  a  given  basic  fact  of  the  psychic  life,  there  is 
the  infinite  manifoldness  of  individual  endowments.  These 
endowments  can  never  be  exhaustively  scientifically  described, 
but  they  may  be  arranged  in  main  groups,  e.  g.  sexual  differ- 
ences, so-called  temperaments,  intellectual  endowments,  family 
types,  race  peculiarities,  types  due  to  geographical  and  climatic 
modifications ;  all  these  are  to  be  taken  into  account  in  connec- 
tion with  this  basic  fact  of  the  psychic  life.  That  these  indi- 
vidual differences  are  employed  for  the  formation  of  Christian 
character  is  required  both  by  the  ideal  of  Christian  character 
and  by  the  ideal  of  community  which  is  embraced  in  the  idea 
of  the  kingdom  of  God.1  (b)  The  one  goal  of  the  kingdom  of 
God  gives  the  direction  for  the  diverse  content  of  the  life  of  the 
spirit,  and  is  striven  for  in  the  diverse  forms  of  psychic  activ- 
ity. Thus,  the  unity  of  the  Christian  character  is  combined 
with  its  manifoldness. 

Note  to  §125 : 4 

1.  Do  we  need  to  occidentalize  as  well  as  Christianize  the  Orientals  ? 
The  Germans  are  the  most  enthusiastic  missionary  workers  in  Japan. 
There  is  an  intellectual  sympathy  between  the  two  peoples.  But  Ger- 
man scholars  are  warning  the  missionaries  not  to  think  that  they 
must  Germanize  the  Japanese. 

To  Christians  of  the  German- Anglo-Saxon  mind,  the  leaving  out  of 
the  person-idea  in  God  is  the  dissolution  of  the  God-idea.  But  the 
Orientals  think  in  terms  of  substance  rather  than  in  terms  of  person- 
ality; they  are  more  metaphysical  than  ethical,  more  ontological  than 
psychological.  What  we  do  to  exalt  God  is  to  them  to  lower  the 
thought  of  God.  The  difference  is  not  a  moral  matter;  it  is  a  matter 
of  thought.  Must  we  westernize  the  oriental  God-thought,  that  it 
may  be  Christian?  Or  can  we  Christianize  them  and  leave  them  or- 


250      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

iental  still?  This  is  one  of  the  most  serious  questions  in  the  mis- 
sionary world  to-day. 

Is  personality  essential  to  the  Christian  God-idea?  The  Church 
did  its  work  for  a  thousand  years  with  no  personal  God-idea  in  our 
sense  of  the  term.  The  Christianity  of  the  orthodox  Greek  Church  in 
the  early  centuries  would  have  found  more  hospitality  in  the  oriental 
mind  than  in  our  German- Anglo-Saxon  type.  Is  the  Greek  Church  a 
Christian  Church?  (According  to  Harnack  the  Greek  Church  is  a 
combination  of  Greek  religion  with  Christian  imagery.) 

Is  there  an  intellectual  communion  with  God  as  well  as  a  moral 
communion  ?  May  it  be  said,  "  Other  sheep  I  have  which  are  not  of 
this  moral  fold  " —  Spinoza,  for  example  ?  Mysticism  is  that  com- 
munion with  God  from  which  moral  effort  is  excluded;  the  mystics 
found  God,  but  not  through  moral  action.  "  Hew  the  wood  and  thou 
shalt  find  me;  lift  the  stone  and  I  am  there."  That  is  the  western 
idea.  The  eastern  way  is  that  of  introspection  and  contemplation. 
The  western  type  is  the  Martha-life,  but  Jesus  preferred  the  oriental 
type,  the  Mary-life.  Are  we  too  narrow  in  our  ethical  rigorism?  Is 
not  God  the  God  of  the  mystic  and  of  the  philosophical  approach,  as 
well  as  the  God  of  the  ethical,  practical  approach? 

With  regard  to  missions  to  Orientals,  one  of  three  courses  is  pos- 
sible: Either  you  may  Christianize  from  the  western  point  of  view, 
but  to  do  this  you  must  philosophize  from  the  western  point  of  view; 
or  you  may  give  the  Christian  kernel,  not  insisting,  however,  on  the 
personal  God-idea ;  or  you  may  make  up  your  mind  that  Christianity 
is  a  folk-religion,  especially  adapted  to  western  minds. 

5.  The  everywhere  recurring  main  features  of  Christian 
character  Christian  ethics  has  to  define.  They  designate  partly 
the  religious  and  partly  the  moral  sides  of  the  Christian  life, 
and  of  course  from  the  basic  Christian  standpoint  the  religious 
character  of  the  Christian  is  the  foundation  of  his  moral  char- 
acter. 


§126.  The  Main  Features  of  the  Religious  Character  of  the 
Christian. 

1.  The  content  of  the  religious  character  of  the  Christian  is 
filial  sense  toward  God  (v.   §110:2,  c).     In  this  filial  sense 
the  love  of  God  required  in  the  Christian  norm  of  life  is  actual- 
ized.    But  it  must  take  shape  in  two  essential  directions,  if  it 
is  to  give  the  permanent  stamp  of  sanctification  to  the  whole 
personal  life  and  to  all  its  relations  toward  the  world. 

2.  The  religious  character  of  the  Christian  on  the  side  of 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTUKE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     251 

knowledge,  (a)  As  personal  Christian  conviction  in  distinc- 
tion from  authoritative  assent,  it  has  its  basis  in  the  heart's 
trust  in  Jesus  Christ  and  grows  to  experiential  certainty  by 
means  of  the  initial  experience  of  the  redemptive  effects  of  his 
spirit,  (b)  As  clearness  of  the  Christian  judgment  concern- 
ing the  world  and  life  in  their  relation  to  God,  together  with 
capacity  of  critical  judgment  as  regards  foreign  religious  views, 
it  has  a  similar  experiential  basis.1  (c)  Outwardly  the  Chris- 
tian conviction  is  led  to  protect  itself  in  a  personal  confession 
of  that  conviction  and  vindication  of  it.2 

Notes  to  §126 :  2 

1.  We  should  send  to  the  foreign  field  our  foremost  Christian  per- 
sonalities with  formed  Christian  judgments. 

2.  Christian  apologetics  is  an  intellectual  process  which  has  a  re- 
ligious and  ultimately  a  moral  function. 

3.  On  the  side  of  the  will  and  the  feelings,  the  Christian 
character  must  exemplify  and  effectuate  itself.     Trustful  resig- 
nation to  God  and  joy  in  fellowship  with  God  must  remain  in 
mastery  in  the  essential  relations  to  the  world.1     There  are 
two  relations  which  come  essentially  into  consideration  here : 
(a)   In  the  experiences  of  the  earthly  life  the  Christian  main- 
tains his  religious  character  (a)  by  accepting  the  joys  of  this 
life  from  God's  hands  in  inner  freedom  and  with  simplicity  2 
and  thankfulness;  (ft)  by  bearing  the  sufferings  imposed  upon 
him  as  saving  pedagogic  means  for  himself  and  under  some 
circumstances  as  means  of  blessing  to  others;  on  the  whole  as 
bearing  the  "  cross  "  imposed  upon  him  in  patient  and  cour- 
ageous silence,  struggling  for  the  supreme  goal  of  "  glorying 
in  tribulation"  (KavxavOai  ev  6\i\}ia.<nv} .     This  suffering  is  to  be 
distinguished  from  the  predominant  sentiment  of  Old  Testa- 
ment piety  and  from  stoical  apathy.3     (y)   The  Christian  re- 
ligious character  is  further  maintained  by  meeting  death  not 
in  the  fear  of  death,  but  in  victorious  confidence  that  even  it 
cannot  separate  us  from  God's  love,  but  can  only  contribute  to 
the   consummation    of   God's   redeeming   work.4     (b)   As    re- 
gards   the   tasks   of   life,    the    Christian    shows    his   religious 
character  by  joyously  accepting  them  as  the  calling  given  him 
by  God.5 


252      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Notes  to  §126 :  3 

1.  We  are  not  Christianized  if  joy  in  God  is  not  present  in  all  the 
providential  occurrences  of  our  lives.     This  is  not  the  Stoical  *Tapa£la. 
It  is  more  akin  to  the  feeling  of  the  fireman  who  realizes  that  he  has 
rescued  the  child,  but  at  the  cost  of  his  own  life. 

2.  The  truly  "  simple  life  "  is  found  in  the  inner  world  of  man. 

3.  It  is  a  patient  and  courageous  silence,  the  silence  of  inner  joyous 
blessedness. 

4.  What  is  the  Christian  attitude  toward  death  ?     What  is  it  on  ac- 
count of  which  the  fear  of  death  is  eliminated  from  human  life?    We 
must  return  to  what  made  our  fathers  great  in  this  particular.     It  is  a 
wonderful  thing  for  man  not  to  fear  death  —  a  certainly  triumphant 
foe! 

5.  Christian  joy  in  prosperity  and  in  adversity,  in  life  and  in  death, 
is  the  purest  test  of  Christianity.     The  coal-heaver  who  accepts  his 
vocation  from  God  is  better  off  and  more  dignified  than  the  king  who 
makes  no  such  reference. 

4.  The  Christian  religious  character  lives  in  prayer,  (a) 
The  source  but  also  supreme  norm  of  Christian  prayer  lies  in 
faith  in  Jesus  Christ  himself.  Prayer  impels  to  communion 
of  the  heart  with  God  as  the  heavenly  Father,  and  to  prayer 
in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ,  i.  e.  in  his  sense  and  spirit,  (b) 
Every  prayer  springing  from  faith  must  contain  an  element 
of  thankfulness,  i.  e.  of  joyous  thought  of  God's  benefits,  espe- 
cially of  his  revelation  of  love  in  Jesus  Christ ;  and  prayer 
must  strive  to  the  goal  of  a  prayer  of  thanksgiving.  But  the 
necessary  way  to  that  goal  for  finite  and  especially  for  sinful 
man  is  the  petition  (supplication)  which  is  kindled  to  true 
power  in  thankfulness  for  benefits  experienced,  (c)  The  sub- 
ject-matter of  Christian  supplication  (petition)  is  especially 
spiritual  gifts,  but  also  outer  interests  as  well.  It  is  precisely 
in  honest  petition  that  we  come  to  learn  the  superior  impor- 
tance of  the  goods  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  that  we  come  also  to 
resignation  to  God's  will,  in  which  Christian  character  is  more 
powerfully  manifest  than  in  our  stormy  petitions,  (d)  Hear- 
ing of  prayer  is  assured  to  true  prayer  in  the  spirit  of  Jesus. 
It  consists  not  only  in  the  inner  self-uplifting  of  the  petitioner, 
but  in  communication  of  the  Spirit  to  him  (i.  e.  the  ethico- 
religious  content  which  we  have  in  Jesus  Christ).  The  hearing 
of  prayer  may  also  involve  the  bringing  about  of  what  one  prays 
for,  and  will  do  so  if  it  is  in  accord  with  the  counsel  of  God. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     253 

To  be  sure  our  prayer  does  not  first  make  God  willing.  Our 
beseeching  receptivity  first  makes  our  own  selves  capable  of  re- 
ceiving the  gifts  and  the  blessings  of  God,  which  could  not  be 
communicated  to  us  without  our  prayer.1  (e)  The  unspoken 
uplift  of  the  heart  to  God,  which  can  and  ought  to  be  a  settle- 
ment lastingly  accompanying  life,  is  real  prayer.  But  grati- 
tude and  petition  are  first  shaped  into  clearness  by  inner 
speech,  and  they  can  come  to  audible  expression  in  the  individ- 
ual in  the  stress  of  the  heart,  and  must  become  so  in  public 
worship.  Regularity  in  the  forms  and  times  of  our  daily  life 
promotes  prayer,  but -on  the  other  hand  all  mechanicizing  kills 
prayer. 

Note  to  §126 :  4 

1.  "What  does  Professor  Foster  believe?"  asks  a  Southern  paper. 
"  He  denies  the  Deity  of  Christ,  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures, 
atonement  by  blood,  and  the  efficacy  of  prayer,  save  as  it  has  reflex 
influence." 

I  do  not  understand  that  I  am  saying  that.  That  would  be  like 
trying  to  lift  one's  self  by  tugging  at  our  own  bootstraps.  Prayer  is 
a  part  of  the  process  of  the  divine  life.  It  is  natural  for  the  birds  to 
sing,  but  in  singing  they  are  not  making  God  will  to  do  something. 
It  is  a  part  of  the  process  of  reality.  Prayer  is  inalienable  to  human 
nature.  It  is  God  doing  the  thing.  Our  prayer  does  not  make  God 
willing;  but  there  is  something  worthful  even  in  connection  with  the 
prayer  for  rain.  Prayer  is  as  inalienable  a  function  of  the  human 
spirit  as  the  swimming  of  the  fish  is  to  the  fish.  It  is  not  properly 
defined  as  doing  something  to  God  without  which  he  would  not  do 
something  which  he  does. 

See  Wimmer :  My  Struggle  for  Light. 

As  B.  W.  Bacon  maintains  (Current  Literature,  1905,  p.  401),  the 
prayer  of  faith  opens  channels  for  the  grace  which  works  according 
to  law. 

§127.  The  Main  Features  of  the  Moral  Life  of  the  Christian. 

1.  The  fundamental  fact  of  the  moral  character  of  the  Chris- 
tian is  love  to  neighbor,  which  springs  from  true  love  to  God 
and  which  is  an  expression  of  the  life  of  true  love  to  God. 
This  character  also,  like  the  religious,  must  shape  itself  in  two 
essential  directions,  if  it  is  to  give  the  permanent  stamp  of 
sanctification  to  the  personal  life  in  its  relations  to  the  world. 

2.  What  belongs  to  the  moral  character  of  the  Christian  on 


254      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

the  side  of  moral  insight?  (a)  First  of  all,  a  personal  moral 
conviction.  This  manifests  itself  in  a  self-dependent  moral 
conscience,  whose  endowment  is  of  course  given,  but  whose  de- 
velopment and  individualizatiou  for  the  personal  life  is  an 
acquirement  of  personality,  (b)  This  conscience  expresses  it- 
self in  (a)  the  clearness  of  moral  judgment;  at  the  same  time 
in  (ft)  the  critical  capacity  of  judgment  with  respect  to  for- 
eign moral  views  and  principles,  but  especially  in  (y)  tender- 
ness (sensitiveness)  of  moral  feeling,  while  passionate  violence 
of  feeling  is  more  an  affair  of  nature  than  a  mark  of  moral 
character.1 

Note  to  §127 :  2 

1.  There  is  much  in  the  business  world  and  in  the  theater  which 
tends  to  blunt  the  sensitiveness  of  moral  feeling.  There  is  a  brutal 
obtuseness  which  is  both  cause  and  effect  of  the  "  practical  life  "  of  the 
hard-headed  business  man. 

3.  How  docs  the  moral  character  of  the  Christian  exemplify 
itself  on  the  side  of  the  activity  of  the  will?     (a)  As  regards 
one's  own  physical  and  psychical  nature,  not  merely  in  a  nega- 
tive independence,  but  in  a  positive  mastery  of  the  physical  and 
psychical  forces  given  us,  where  we  are  called  upon  to  employ 
them  in  the  service  of  moral  tasks.1     (b)  As  regards  the  outer 
world,  negatively,   in  independence  of  its  temptations;   posi- 
tively, in  our  using  the  goods  that  fall  to  us  in  the  promotion 
of  our  moral  vocation;  again,  not  in  indolently  letting  suffer- 
ings come  upon  us,  but  when  they  are  inescapable,  utilizing 
them  as  means  of  culture  for  ourselves  and  as  a  field  for  the 
exercise  of  love  toward  others. 

Note  to  §127: 3 

1.  Modern  science  insists  on  the  unity  of  man's  development.  Ac- 
cording to  physiological  psychology  there  is  no  salvation  of  soul  apart 
from  the  body. 

4.  A  test  of  the  acquired  Tightness  of  moral  insight  and  also 
of  the  culture  of  the  will  is  especially  the  sure  selection  and 
employment  of  means  which  are  the  correct  means  for  the  prose- 
cution of  moral  ends.     The  Jesuitical  principle  is  anti-ethical, 
viz.  "  if  the  end  is  permissible,  the  means  are  also  permissible  " 
(si  finis  licitu$f  et  media  sunt  licita).     This  principle  in  an 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     255 

unjustifiable  way  subsumes  the  end  under  the  category  of  the 
permissible  rather  than  under  that  of  the  morally  necessary, 
and  in  false  isolation  considers  the  means  only  in  its  relation 
to  the  one  end,  instead  of  in  its  own  import  and  in  its  other 
relations  and  consequences. 

0.  The  Formation  of  Christian  Character,  Especially  in  View 
of  Sin. 

§128.  Education  and  Self -Education. 

1.  The  religio-ethical  character  can  be  developed  only  through 
the  interconnection  of  education  and  self -education,  (a) 
Within  the  Christian  community  under  normal  circumstances 
the  catechumen  is  to  be  placed  under  a  regular  educative  in- 
fluence which  aims  at  the  formation  of  religio-ethical  charac- 
ter; but  the  supreme  problem  of  this  hetero-education  is  to 
awaken  (a)  religio-ethical  self-dependence  and  (/8)  the  capacity 
to  self -education  by  the  determining  influences  from  without.1 
(b)  Moreover,  whoever  has  outgrown  education  in  the  nar- 
rower sense  of  the  word  remains  under  the  pedagogic  influence 
of  human  society,  and  of  the  destiny  of  life,  and  the  fortunes 
of  life,  in  which  faith  recognizes  a  divine  education.  Still  this 
higher  education  is  after  all  but  a  phase  of  the  more  specific 
task  of  one's  own  self-education. 

Note  to  §128:1 

1.  The  old  emphasis  was  upon  "  sound  doctrine,"     That  has  its 
worth,  but  it  was  putting  the  part  for  the  whole.     Let  the  category  of 
good  and  bad  have  the  central  place  in  teaching,  as  it  has  in  personal- 
ity.    A  brief  outline  of  Christian  ethics  as  a  catechism  should  be  put 
into  the  hands  of  young  people. 

2.  The  activities  through  which  self-education  toward  the 
end  of  Christian  character  goes  on  may  be  analyzed  into  three 
groups,     (a)   First   of   all,   Christian  character   is   developed 
through  the  practical  life  itself,  viz.  through  the  fulfilment  of 
the  vocational  and  extra-vocational  duties  of  love    (v.    §122, 
§123,  §127:3),  and  through  trustful  subordination  in  all  of 
life's  experiences  and  tasks,  to  the  will  of  God.     (b)   Also  the 
activities  of  recuperation,  or  recreation,  correctly  used,  serve 
to  develop  the  psychical  functions  which  are  the  material  of 


256      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

character-building,  and  to  bring  them  under  the  mastery  of  the 
will,  (c)  Still  more  immediately  edification  serves  the  forma- 
tion of  steadfast  religious  and  moral  life,  i.  e.  both  religious 
edification  in  work  and  prayer,  and  moral  edification  in  self- 
examination,  in  self -clarification,  and  in  self-encouragement,1 
Vows  belonging  in  this  region  of  edification  are  permissible  on 
evangelical  soil  only  in  the  sense  of  earnest  resolutions  in  the 
presence  of  God,  or  of  solemn  promise  in  the  presence  of  man 
in  connection  with  moral  society.2 

Notes  to  §128:2 

1.  To  turn  recreation  into  vocation  is  immoral. 

2.  Vows  in  the  old  sense  have  place  only  in  the  Catholic  dualism  of 
the  moral  life. 

3.  The  normal  relation  of  the  three  groups  admits  of  only 
general  definition.     Group  (a) — duties  of  love  —  should  be 
the  leading  one,  of  course.     As  to  groups  (b)  and  (c),  the  for- 
mer —  recreation  —  should  preserve  and  increase  the  natural 
powers  or  the  practical  activity  of  the  Christian,  and  the  lat- 
ter—  edification  —  should  preserve  and   increase  the  religio- 
ethical  motive  for  the  practical  Christian  life.1 

Note  to  §128:  3 

1.  To  this  extent  Muirhead  is  right  when  he  maintains  that  the 
function  and  test  of  cult  is  the  preservation  and  increase  of  human 
powers  for  the  practical  life. 

4.  On  the  basis  of  the  necessity  of  an  alternation  of  work 
on  the  one  hand  and  of  recreation  and  edification  on  the  other, 
the  order  of  Sunday  finds  its  inner  justification.     In  the  Chris- 
tian church  Sunday  has  taken  the  place  of  the  statutory  Sab- 
batic commandment1 

Note  to  §128: 4 

1.  As  Hermann  Schultz  says,  the  inner  attitude  and  outer  habit 
with  reference  to  Sunday  is  a  sure  test  of  piety  and  a  wholesome 
ethico-religious  life.  But  we  must  eliminate  the  appearance  of  arbi- 
trariness and  legalism  from  the  Sunday-idea.  This  will  leave  it  with 
the  inner  vindication  which  the  functional  always  has.  The  Puritans 
made  the  mistake  of  eliminating  recreation  and  leaving  only  edifica- 
tion. But  if  recreation  and  edification  were  both  recognized,  perhaps 
each  would  be  the  better  on  account  of  the  other.  Some  Sunday 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     257 

amusements  may  be  injurious,  but  we  must  learn  to  kill  bad  things 
by  extracting  the  element  of  worth  out  of  them  and  presenting  that 
in  unobjectionable  form. 

§129.  The  Question  of  Asceticism  and  the  Struggle  with  Temp- 
tation. 

1.  The  problem  of  the  means  of  virtue  and  of  asceticism,  i.  e. 
of  the  doctrine  of  the  means  of  virtue,  is  broached  in  connec- 
tion with  the  definition  of  our  various  activities,      (a)   The 
question  is  whether  according  to  evangelical  principles  there 
may  be  a  deed  which  is  only  drill  or  discipline,  or  practice  for 
ethico-religious  activities,  but  is  not  itself  any  actualization  of 
the  religio-ethical   ideal.     Some  ethicists  have  answered  this 
question   in   the   negative   most   decidedly,      (b)   It   must   be 
granted  that  the   activities   of  recreation   and  edification    (v. 
§128 :  2,  b  and  c)  seem  to  serve  the  practical  religio-ethical  life 
only  as  means  (v.  §128 :  2,  a).     Yet  we  may  not  ignore  that  on 
the  one  hand  the  practical  Christian  life  in  vocational  work 
and  in  the  exemplification  of  faith  is  not  only  direct  actualiza- 
tion of  the  Christian  ideal,  but  also  means  of  character-building, 
and  that  on  the  other  hand  again  the  religio-ethical  character 
is  not  only  formed  but  its  ideal  is  actualized  in  the  free  activi- 
ties of  play  and  in  the  hours  of  edification  also.     In  fact,  there- 
fore, nothing  should  be  mere  means  in  the  Christian  life,  but 
everything  should  be  both  intrinsically  worthful  and  also  serv- 
iceable in  character-building. 

2.  Asceticism  in  the  narrower  negative  sense,  i.  e.  activity 
directed  toward  the  weakening  or  deadening  of  natural  powers, 
is  right  according  to  evangelical  views  only  so  far  as  all  pos- 
itive Christian  character-building  requires  a  negation  of  im- 
pulses and  inclinations  that  contradict  the  Christian  norm  of 
life.     But  this  asceticism  does  not  go  dualistically  alongside  of 
the  activities  of  the  practical  Christian  life  and  of  recreation 
and  edification,  but  takes  place  within  that  life,  viz.  (a)  in  the 
self-denial  which  the  tasks  of  one's  vocation  and  the  experiences 
of  one's  life  impose  upon  one;  (b)  also  in  the  self-discipline, 
(c)  in  the  activities  of  recreation  and  use  of  powers,  and  (d) 
in  serious  self-collection  for,  and  in  the  hours  of  edification. 

3.  This  negative  side  of  the  Christian  life  comes  to  validity 


258      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

especially  in  connection  with  temptation,  i.  e.  incitement  of  the 
natural  and  especially  of  the  sinful  will  awakened  from  within. 
By  such  a  will  is  meant  a  will  that  is  counter  to  God's  will. 
Even  the  life  of  Jesus  was  a  conflict  with  temptation,  so  far  as 
he  negated  such  natural  impulses  of  the  natural  life  —  impulses 
even  which  in  other  directions  indicated  the  will  of  God.  But 
the  following  considerations  are  to  be  urged  against  the  idea 
that  the  ascetic  tendency  was  dominant  with  Jesus :  (a)  Jesus' 
own  appearance  and  the  impression  which  he  made  upon  the 
people ;  (/?)  Jesus'  judgment  that  not  the  absorption  of  the 
self  in  God,  but  the  redemption  of  the  soul  is  the  highest  good ; 
(y)  Jesus'  warfare  against  all  self-chosen  performances  through 
which  the  simple  and  obvious  commandments  of  God  are  sub- 
ordinated and  abbreviated.  It  is  absolutely  true  that  character 
can  be  constructed  only  in  constant  struggle  with  temptation  in 
our  case,  for  in  us  a  sinful  bent  of  the  will  persists.  In  us, 
therefore,  the  stimuli  of  the  outer  world  and  of  sinful  human 
society  evoke  a  sinful  resistance  to  the  will  of  God;  hence  the 
need,  not  of  Catholic  asceticism,  but  of  self-denial,  self-dis- 
cipline, self -collection,  in  the  moral,  religious  life.1 

Note  to  §129 : 3 

1.  Pfleiderer  bases  his  discussion  of  this  matter  on  the  words  of 
Jesus :  "  Watch  and  pray  lest  ye  enter  into  temptation."  He  says 
that  watchfulness  is  required  in  order  to  self-knowledge.  This  self- 
knowledge  is  required  because  of  our  weaknesses  and  defects,  but  in 
connection  with  this  self-knowledge  we  also  gain  a  knowledge  of  the 
world  and  of  the  spirit  of  the  times.  In  connection  with  pryyer  he 
discusses  self-discipline,  and  that  discussion  leads  to  what  he  calls 
bodily  and  psychic  dietetics  and  ascetics.  He  raises  the  question  as 
to  what  is  the  end  to  be  accomplished  by  these.  His  answer  is,  Not 
mortification  of  our  sensibilities,  but  free  mastery  of  ourselves;  not 
the  reduction  of  the  energies  of  our  life,  but  the  mastery  of  them. 
He  even  justifies  fasts  as  voluntary  abstinence  from  sensuous  gratifi- 
cation. He  closes  with  a  caution  against  making  the  means  of  self- 
education  an  end,  or  valuing  as  meritorious  those  practices  whose 
necessity  presupposes  an  existing  defect  in  the  moral  life  and  in 
skilfulness. 

With  reference  to  all  this,  it  should  be  said  that  we  should  not 
presume  to  dictate  to  other  people  ascetic  habits  on  the  basis  of  our 
own  conscious  need  of  them.  Let  their  own  needs  regulate  them. 
Let  us  not  legislate  for  other  people  with  reference  to  dancing,  the 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     259 

theatre,  and  the  playing  of  games.     Asceticism  must  be  an  individual 
matter  entirely. 

See  E.  E.  Purinton:     The  Philosophy  of  Fasts. 

§130.  Christian  Character  and  Recurring  Guilt. 

1.  We  do  not  escape  lapse  and  guilt  in  our  struggle  with 
temptation.     The  more  the  Christian  conscience  is  developed, 
the  finer  does  the  feeling  concerning  any  transgression  of  the 
divine  will  become   (v.    §127:2,   b).     The  guilt-feeling  thus 
becomes  keener  also,  and  in  this  feeling  we  are  conscious  of 
our  own  schism  with  God  and  separation  from  him. 

2.  The  stability  of  Christian  character  in  respect  to  guilt 
can  be  maintained  only  through  that  which  forms  its  basis,  viz. 
the  forgiveness  of  sin  granted  us  in  Jesus  Christ,  which  ad- 
mits us  into  the  full  fellowship  with  God  in  spite  of  the  daily 
recurring  guilt,   thus   avoiding  paralysis  and   discouragement 
through  failure.     This  forgiveness  is  appropriated  in  the  prayer 
of    faith.     This    faith     itself,     however,     is    established    and 
strengthened  through  the  gospel  as  it  is  proffered  to  us  in  the 
Scriptures  and  in  preaching  and  public  and  private  proclama- 
tion. 

3.  This  faith  can  grow  in  us  toward  the  goal  of  a  steadfast 
certitude  of  redemption,  and  yet  in  its  growth  it  passes  through 
stages  and  fluctuations.1     We  advance  toward  that  goal  of  certi- 
tude by  our  faith  receiving  the  confirmation   of  experience. 
We  experience  the  forgiving  love  of  God  not  only  in  the  com- 
munion of  prayer,  but  also  in  the  practical  life,  as  often  as  we 
see  in  the  guidance  of  life  something  of  God's  fatherly  educa- 
tion, and  find  in  the  tasks  of  life  something  of  the  incentive 
and  power  of  God's  Spirit.2     But  this  confirmation  of  experi- 
ence remains  fragmentary.     Hence  the  basis  of  faith  in  the 
gospel  of  God's  forgiveness  in  Christ  underlies  everything  else. 
To  that  gospel  we  return  as  to  a  fountain. 

Notes  to  §130:  3 

1.  There  are  periods  of  silence  and  periods  of  revival.     In  the 
former  probably  forces  are  gathered.     Nowhere  is  there  an  ortholinear 
development. 

2.  Theoretically  revelation  is  as  universal  as  the  process  of  the 
world.     But  that  is  actually  revelation  for  us  which  fulfils  some  func- 


260      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

tion  within  our  experience  as  the  educative  purpose  of  God.  While 
potentially  all  reality  is  revelation  of  God,  actually  that  is  revelation 
in  which  we  can  trace  God's  hand. 

y.  The  Fundamental  Frame  of  Mind  of  the  Christian  (Basic 
Temper  or  Disposition  of  the  Christian  Character). 

§131.  Relation  betiveen  the  Dignity  of  the  Christian  Character 
and  Honor  in  Human  Society. 

1.  On  the  basis  of  God's  forgiveness  the  Christian  is  cer- 
tain that  he  possesses  supreme  dignity,  or  absolute  personal 
worth;  even  in  his  first  nascent  religio-ethical  character  is  he 
certain  of  this,      (a)   The  religious  dignity  which  the  Christian 
has  as  child  of  God  is  gift  of  God,  however,  and  as  such  is 
hidden  from  man,  since  it  is  appropriated  only  by  the  faith  of 
the  heart,     (b)   Equally  so  does  the  moral  dignity  that  the 
Christian  has  as  a  member  in  the  kingdom  of  righteousness 
and  love  depend  upon  God's  grace  and  the  work  of  his  Spirit. 
Therefore  it  is  God's  judgment  that  is  regulative  in  this  whole 
matter  of  dignity  and  honor. 

2.  It  follows  precisely  from  this  that  this  supreme  dignity 
of  the  Christian  is  independent  of  appreciation  in  empirical 
society  —  in  other  words,  is  independent  of  honor  among  men.1 
(a)   The  Christian,  therefore,  may  not  aspire  after  this  honor 
among  men  as  the  supreme  thing.     He  must  lay  aside  timidity 
before  the  judgment  of  men.2     (b)  He  may  and  ought  to  con- 
sider the  dishonor  which  really  comes  to  him  in  the  fulfilment 
of  his  vocation  as  an  exaltation  of  his  honor. 

Notes  to  §131 :  2 

1.  Dignity  is  inner,  and  has  religious  references;  honor  is  outer, 
and  has  social  reference. 

2.  He  must  so  fear  God  that  he  fears  no  one  else. 

3.  However,  the  recognition  of  rcligio-ethical  personality  on 
the  part  of  the  religious  and  ethical  community  of  men  (in 
other  words,  ethical  honor)   is  a  relative  good.     As  such  we 
ought  to  seek  to  acquire  and  preserve  it.     But  the  means  to  this 
end  is  the  exemplification  of  Christian  character  itself.     Of 
course  the  result  in  question  is  not  always  guaranteed  to  this 
exemplification. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     261 

4.  We  must  consider  social  or  official  or  professional  honor 
entirely  as  a  relative  good,  as  compared  with  the  dignity  of 
Christian  character,  (a)  This  honor  is  not  always  coincident 
with  honor  from  good  and  devout  men,  nor  is  it  always  coinci- 
dent with  religio-ethical  dignity  in  the  presence  of  God.  (b) 
Yet  even  this  honor  has  its  worth  as  means  to  the  prosecution 
of  our  special  calling  which  we  have  to  carry  on  in  human 
society  with  its  conventional  requirements,  (c)  Therefore  the 
demands  and  conditions  of  social  honor  are  to  be  fulfilled,  but 
only  so  far  as  they  are  ethically  justified;  and  professional 
honor  is  to  be  preserved,  but  only  so  far  as  it  can  be  done  with 
ethically  justifiable  means.  If  this  is  not  thus  possible,  then 
injury  to  us  from  this  source  is  to  be  borne  as  a  burden  imposed 
upon  us  in  the  providence  of  God  himself. 


I.  The   Christian   Life   and   Hereafter:   the    Question   of 
Eternal  Life. 

1.  Even  here  the  Christian  possesses  an  eternal  life,  i.e.  a 
life  exalted  above  this  transitory  world.     He  possesses  this  life 
in  the  certainty  of  his  divinely  given  dignity  and  in  his  over- 
coming of  the  world  and  of  sin.     But  this  is  to  say  that  eternal 
life  is  not  simply  a  gift,  or  donation;  it  is  an  achievement. 
The  enjoyment  of  eternal  life  is  what  is  meant  by  blessedness ; 
therefrom  constant  blessedness  would  seem  to  be  required  as 
the  fundamental  frame  of  mind  of  the  Christian,  or  basic  tem- 
per of  the  Christian  character. 

2.  But  even  Jesus  Christ  in  his  earthly  life  could  not  enjoy 
blessedness  of  the  life  with  God  in  a  static  way,  but  had  to 
achieve  this  blessedness  through  trouble  and  struggle  and  temp- 
tation and  sorrow.     But  if  that  be  true  in  the  case  of  Jesus, 
much  more  is  it  true  in  the  case  of  the  Christian.     For  the 
Christian  reaches  this  goal  of  blessedness  not  only  through  con- 
flict, but  through  guilt  and  through  the  appropriation  of  for- 
giveness in  faith.     Therefore  the  success  of  the  Christian  is 
partly  dependent  upon  the  burdens  of  his  life,  how  heavy  they 
are  or  how  light  they  are.     His  success  on  the  whole  is  de- 
pendent also  upon  the  entire  character  of  his  mind  which  God 
has  given  to  the  individual.     The  goal  is  to  attain  a  steadfast 
enjoyment  of  life  in  God. 


262      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

3.  There  is  a  yearning  or  longing  on  the  part  of  every  Chris- 
tian after  entire  release  from  inner  and  outer  warfare,  and  after 
an  undisturbed  enjoyment  of  communion  with  God.1  But  this 
yearning,  though  it  springs  from  God,  must  be  patient  at  the 
same  time  and  maintain  fidelity  in  the  present  calling.2  Im- 
patience is  in  contradiction  with  the  Christian  character.3 

Notes  to  §132 : 3 

1.  "  As  the  hart  panteth  after  the  water  brooks,  so  panteth  my  soul 
after   thee,    O    God!"     "Whom    have    I    on    earth    beside    Thee?" 
"  Come  unto  me,  and  I  will  give  you  rest."     "  Thou  hast  made  us 
for  Thyself,  and  the  soul  is  restless  till  it  rests  in  Thee." 

2.  Exaggeration  of  transcendence  tends  to  yearning  without  pa- 
tience; exaggerated  immanence  to  patience  with  yearning.     Philoso- 
phy has  tried  to  combine  the  two  reflectively,  and  to  have  the  mean- 
ing (values)  in  the  fact  here  and  now.     Thus  it  would  overcome  the 
dualism  between  joyless  labor  here  and  laborless  joy  hereafter. 

3.  Paul  could  say,  "  I  have  learned  in  whatsoever  state  I  am  there- 
with to  be  content."     Note  tbe  antithesis  of  Christianity  to  suicide. 
It  is  a  life  without  values  which  logically  leads  to  suicide  —  the  life 
in  which  there  is  no  yearning  and  no  patience.     Christianity  from  its 
central  principle   (that  God  is  the  soul's  portion)    is  antithetic  to 
suicide.     (See  sermons  by  Phillips  Brooks  on  "  The  Light  of  the 
World.") 

4.  The  hope  remains  that  God  himself,  through  death,  will 
bring  eternal  life,  hidden  in  the  Christian,  to  further  light. 
The  hope  of  full  redemption  and  consequent  blessedness,  and 
of  the  consummation  of  Christian  character  on  to  full  godli- 
ness —  that  is  the  Christian  hope.1 

Note  to  §132 :  4 

1.  Is  there  any  importance  in  the  Biblical  thought  of  the  resurrec- 
tion of  the  body  for  the  Christian?  Is  Christian  life  poorer  by 
stripping  that  life  off?  Does  that  thought  function  serviceably  in  any 
way  in  the  Christian  life?  Is  a  bodiless  immortality  a  thing  that  man 
longs  for?  Has  the  Christian  spirit  any  hankering  after  a  bodiless 
immortality?  If  you  snip  off  from  our  Christian  symbolism  the 
resurrection-of-the-body  idea,  would  our  feeling  of  the  roundness  and 
perfectness  of  our  salvation  and  blessedness  be  intact?  If  we  cannot 
keep  it  scientifically  and  philosophically,  would  it  be  well  to  keep  it 
poetically,  as  a  means  of  expressing  our  need  of  a  whole  rich  round 
life? 

It  seems  to  be  the  business  of  the  cosmical  process  to  produce 
ethical  personalities.  If  so,  would  it  not  damn  the  process,  if,  when 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     263 

that  was  done,  they  were  snuffed  out?  If  the  individual  perishes, 
the  race  perishes  ultimately,  and  by  so  much  as  the  individual 
perishes,  the  race  perishes.  I  do  not  see  any  way  to  vindicate  the 
rationality  of  the  whole  process  on  the  basis  of  the  destruction  of  the 
Exemplar.  The  basis  of  my  own  hope  and  conviction  is  in  the  fact 
that  the  cosmic  process  seems  to  be  tending  to  make  ethical  per- 
sonalities. 

There  is  much  agnosticism  among  thoughtful  people  today  with 
regard  to  immortality.  What  then  about  the  grounding  of  ethics  on 
the  belief  in  immortality?  Is  it  not  a  dangerous  doctrine  today? 
What  modus  vivendi  can  there  be  for  those  who  cannot  subsume  im- 
mortality under  the  category  of  reality?  Is  there  no  life  hereafter? 
Then  pitch  this  life  high,  and  love  your  loves  now. 

Bibliography:  Ingersoll  lectures  by  Royce,  James,  Osier,  G.  A. 
Gordon,  Crothers;  Miinsterberg:  The  Eternal  Life:  Fiske:  Everlast- 
ing Life;  Wundt:  System  dcr  Philosophic,  the  section  on  Religion. 

8.   The  Single  Virtues. 
§133.  The  Task  of  this  Section,  and  the  Matter  of  Division. 

1.  Part  b  was  upon  the  becoming  of  Christian  personality 
in  the  fulfilment  of  vocation  and  duty,  and  part  c  was  on  the 
becoming  of  Christian  personality  as  formation  of  virtue  and 
character.  We  are  now  concerned  with  the  coordination  of 
these  two  sections  concerning  duty  and  virtue.  Individual 
ethics  terminates  in  a  table  of  duties  and  virtues.1  (a)  An 
analysis  of  the  Christian  norm  of  life  into  a  series  of  duties 
for  every  individual  follows  from  the  idea  of  the  fulfilment  of 
the  duty  of  vocation.  This  was  worked  out  in  §§121  to  124. 
This  analysis,  however,  does  not  admit  of  being  pursued  into 
its  specialization-  for  individual  vocation  and  into  all  the  spe- 
cial relations  of  that  vocation,  but  universal  principles  of  duty 
for  the  common  inner  and  outer  relations  of  life  may  be  devel- 
oped from  the  Christian  norm  of  life,  (b)  From  the  idea  of 
the  formation  of  virtue  and  character,  §§125  to  132,  it  fol- 
lows that  Christian  personality  is  exhibited  in  a  series  of  vir- 
tues. Again,  it  must  be  pointed  out,  these  virtues  may  not  be 
exhausted  in  their  specialization,  ever  according  to  individual 
natural  endowment;  but,  as  in  the  former  case,  they  may  be 
exhibited  in  their  common  inner  and  outer  relations,  (c) 
The  principles  of  duties  and  the  virtues  may  be  coordinated, 
i.  e.  correlated.  Virtues  prove  themselves,  reveal  themselves, 


264     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

in  a  corresponding  act  of  duty,  and  the  fulfilment  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  duty  serves  the  development  of  the  corresponding  vir- 
tues. 

Note  to  §133 : 1 

1.  The  relation  of  virtue  to  duty  is  analogous  to  the  relation  of 
organ  to  function. 

2.  The  grouping  may  be  drawn  from  the  distinction  of  the 
essential  relations  in  which  the  exercise  of  Christian  duty  and 
the  formation  of  Christian  character  stand.     Each  of  these  has 
relation  both  to  God  and  to  the  neighbor.     But  in  addition  to 
this,  the  external  world  is  material  for  the  exemplification  of 
love  to  God  and  love  to  neighbor.     Also  one's  own  personal  life 
takes  shape  through  the  exercise  of  duty  and  of  virtue.     There- 
fore there  is  no  fulfilment  of  duty  and  no  formation  of  virtue 
which  does  not  aim  at  the  ethicization  of  the  material  world 
and  of  our  own  personal  life  (v.  §112:  4). 

3.  While  these  different  sides  (love  to  God,  love  to  neigh- 
bor, moralization  of  the  world  and  of  the  self)   are  wanting 
to  no  Christian,  yet  they  appear  in  different  degrees  in  differ- 
ent persons,  and  one  excels  on  one  side  rather  than  on  another. 
These  groups  of  principles  and  the  virtues  may  be  divided  as 
follows:    (a)   the  principles  of  duty  and  the  virtues  of  self- 
moralization   and   world-moralization ;    (b)    the   principles   of 
duty  and  the  love  of  God;  (c)  the  principles  of  duty  and  the 
love  of  neighbor. 

§134.  The  Principles  of  Duty  and  the  Virtues  of  Religio- 
Ethical  Moralization  of  the  Self  and  of  the  World. 

1.  A  moralized  inner  life  arises  in  the  forms  of  the  inner 
life  which  have  been  unfolded  in  the  concepts  of  the  religio- 
ethical  character.  It  is  the  Christian  duty  to  develop  and  or- 
ganize these  forms  of  life.  In  them  the  Christian  virtues  of 
character  are  exhibited  at  the  same  time.  These  two  have 
analogues  in  the  antique  cardinal  virtues ;  in  the  latter  also  the 
formal  construction  is  primarily  sketched  which  the  inner  life 
of  man  must  win  under  the  lead  of  an  unconditioned  norm. 
But  what  those  antique  cardinal  virtues  lacked  was  precisely 
that  religious  foundation  of  the  ethical  life  which  Christian 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     265 

ethics  supplies,  (a)  On  the  side  of  religio-ethical  knowledge 
we  have  an  analogue  to  the  antique  wisdom  (<ro<£ia)  on  Chris- 
tian soil,  also  the  duty  and  virtue  of  wisdom  in  the  valuation  of 
the  true  religious  and  ethical  goal  of  life,  and  sagacity  (TO 
4>PoV»7/Aov)  in  the  correct  appreciation  of  the  special  tasks,  cir- 
cumstances and  also  powers  of  our  own  life.  Both  wisdom 
and  sagacity  proceed  only  from  full  inner  truthfulness  (aXrjdtia) 
in  the  true  religious  sense.1  (b)  In  the  relation  of  the  will 
to  the  religio-ethical  dictates  of  conscience,  we  have  the  virtue 
and  duty  of  conscientiousness  and  faithfulness,  necessarily  com- 
bined with  inner  sincerity.  Now  this  is  an  analogue,  at  least 
on  the  inner  side,  to  the  antique  justice,  or  righteousness 
(SiKcuoow?/).  (c)  In  the  relation  of  the  will  to  our  own  im- 
pulses, we  have  the  duties  of  self-control,  watchfulness  and  so- 
briety, both  in  the  religious  and  in  the  moral  life,  but  at  the 
same  time  the  duty  of  development  of  psychic  forces  and  the 
virtue  of  cultivatedness  (although  this  side  is  not  made  much 
of  in  the  New  Testament).  This  has  its  analogue  in  the  an- 
tique moderation,  or  self-control  (o-oK^/joavvij).  (d)  In  the  re- 
lation of  the  will  to  external  circumstances  and  relationships  we 
have  the  duty  and  virtue  of  manliness,  of  firmness,  or  stability, 
of  perseverance,  as  well  as  of  enthusiasm  and  industry.  The 
analogue  is  the  antique  courage  (avSpeia). 

Note  to  §134 : 1 

1.  He  who  has  that  wisdom  will  be  enabled  to  form  a  world-view 
which  escapes  a  frivolous  and  superficial  optimism  and  a  melancholy 
and  paralyzing  pessimism.     He  will  also  be  able  rightly  to  appreciate 
the  drift  of  the  age,  the  provincial  or  locality  drift,  and  the  personal, 
individual  drift. 

2.  The  ethicization  of  the  personal  life  embraces,  however, 
the  ethicization  of  the  bodily  life,  which  is  intimately  connected 
with  that  of  thought  and  impulse.     The  duty  and  virtue  of 
chastity,  or  purity  in  bodily  life  (ayv«a)  are  to  be  mentioned 
here.     Side  by  side  with  this,  however,  is  the  positive  duty  of 
the  preservation  and  exercise  of  bodily  powers  and  functions, 
with  the  corresponding  virtue  of  control  over  one's  own  body. 

3.  With  this  ethicization  of  the  body  a  portion  of  the  eternal 
world  is  already  consecrated  to  God.     But  the  entire  world  con- 
fronting us  should  be  religiously  and  morally  consecrated  by  us. 


266      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

The  former,  the  religious,  takes  place  by  means  of  the  religious 
elaboration  of  the  experiences  of  life  delineated  in  §126:  3,  as 
well  as  by  means  of  the  knowledge  of  the  rule  of  God  in  the 
world.  The  latter,  the  moral,  takes  place  by  the  employment 
of  the  world  as  material  of  moral  activity,  sketched  in  §127:  3, 
b.  The  evaluation  of  the  world  as  symbol  and  organ  of  the 
spirit  is  effected  through  both  in  a  manner  that  corresponds 
to  Christianity.  The  relevant  virtue  for  this  duty  may  be 
comprehensively  designated  as  at  once  freedom  from  the  world 
and  dominion  over  it. 

§135.  Love  to  God  from  the  Standpoint  of  Duty  and  Virtue. 

1.  Love  to  God  includes  trust  in  God  as  an  essential  moment 
(§112:3).  This  love  also  has  its  roots  in  faith  in  the  sin- 
forgiving  God  (§116).  Thus  faith  itself  is  the  religious  basic 
virtue  of  the  Christian.  But  one  may  also  speak  of  a  duty  of 
faith,  for  those  who  have  received  an  impression  of  Jesus  Christ 
upon  the  conscience,  there  is  the  duty  to  surrender  to  that  im- 
pression, and  for  those  who  have  attained  to  faith  there  is  the 
duty  to  exercise  and  confess  that  faith.1 

Note  to  §135:1 

1.  It  is  faith,  not  a  doctrinal  statement,  that  one  is  required  to 
confess. 

2.  The  specialization  of  the  duty  and  virtue  of  faith  is  ever 
conditioned  by   various  outer  relations  of  life.1     (a)   Corre- 
sponding to  the  benefits  received  from  God  there  are  the  duty 
and  virtue  of   thankfulness,     (b)   Corresponding  to  divinely 
sent  suffering  and  privation  there  are  the  duty  and  virtue  of  res- 
ignation and  patience,  also  of  Christian  contentment  (avrapxtui). 
In  the  face  of  future  needs  there  are  the  duty  and  virtue  of 
freedom  from  anxiety  or  care  as  set  forth  in  the  sixth  chapter  of 
Matthew  by  Jesus,     (c)   Corresponding  to  our  earthly  lot  of 
death,  there  are  the  duty  and  virtue  of  joyousness  over  death 
and  also  of  the  Christian  hope  (eA™'«).2 

Notes  to  §135 : 2 

1.  Is  faith  a  duty? 

2.  There  is  too  little  preaching  of  this  Christian  attitude  toward 
death. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     267 

3.  With  this  trust  in  God  love  to  God  includes  also  (a)  the 
duty  and  virtue  of  reverence  toward  God,  manifesting  itself  in 
thought,  word  and  deed  (<£o/?o«,  euo-e/Jaa,  and  0eoo-e/?eto).     (b) 
Intimately  connected  with  reverence  is  humility  towards  God 
(Ta7r«vo<£poow»/) .     We  do  not  attain  to  humility  by  making  our- 
selves small  before  God  in  an  artificial  way,  either  (a)  through 
the  awakening  of  a  mystical  feeling  of  nothingness  or  vanity, 
or  (/8)  through  the  pietistic  "poor  sinner"  feeling.     We  win 
humility  only  when  we  become  aware  of  the  greatness  of  God's 
omnipotent  holy  love  in  our  believing  filial  acceptance  of  his 
grace.     It  is  from  this  love  alone  that  the  honest  bowing  of  the 
heart  before  God  flows,  both  as  the  bowing  before  his  holiness 
on  account  of  our  sinfulness,  and  the  willing  bowing  before  his 
omnipotent  will  which  disposes  of  us,  a  bowing  that  is  in  sharp 
contrast  with  all  murmuring  against  God  as  well  as  with  all 
vain  glory   (dAa£oveta,  v.   James  4:13-16).     Humility  is  re- 
lated to  one's  neighbor  as  well  as  to  God.     With  reference  to 
the  neighbor  it  is  the  heart  to  serve,  but  this  last  arises  only 
from  faith,  and  it  is  only  from  faith  and  love  that  the  exempli- 
fication of  humility  flows  in  self-appreciation  in  connection  with 
appreciation  of  one's  neighbor. 

4.  The  matter  of  oath  is  a  corollary  of  the  discussion  of  the 
duty  of  love  to  God,  of  the  duty  of  reverence  and  humility. 
Flippancy  and  sacrilege  must  be  excluded  here,  and  oath  should 
be  used  only  in  connection  with  moral  duties  and  values.     Great 
scruple  should  exist  against  the  compulsory  imposition  of  reli- 
gious oath  by  any  authority. 

§136.  Love  to  Neighbor  from  the  Point  of  View  of  Virtue  and 
Duty. 

1.  Love  to  neighbor  includes  esteem  for  one's  neighbor  (v. 
§112:3).  Thus  duties  and  virtues  of  esteem  are  basic,  and 
they  are  also  an  outflow  of  love:  (a)  in  the  duty  and  virtue 
of  righteousness  with  reference  to  the  neighbor  as  a  person  who 
has  rights,  i.e.  legal  rights;  (b)  in  honor  with  reference  to 
one's  neighbor  as  a  social  person ;  (c)  moral  esteem  in  the  nar- 
rower sense  (v.  §135:3)  with  reference  to  neighbor  as  moral 
person  (all  this  involves  approval  and  toleration,  the  prohibition 
of  judging,  mildness  yet  clearness  in  judging) ;  (d)  upright- 


268      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

ness  and  voraciousness  arising  from  inner  truthfulness  (v. 
§134:1,  a),  as  against  lying,  false-witnessing,  any  conscious 
deception  of  neighbor  concerning  our  views  and  thoughts,  i.  e. 
a  deception  that  would  injure  the  relation  of  confidence. 
(Query:  Does  the  Christian  ethics  exclude  as  inadmissible 
the  so-called  "  lie  of  necessity  "  ?) 

2.  The  duties  and  virtues  of  love  in  the  narrower  sense  are 
mainly  the  following:  (a)  friendliness  in  intercourse  with  one's 
neighbor ;  (b)  thankfulness  in  reception  of  benefits,  and  piety 
toward  moral  authority;  (c)  gentleness  and  placability  in  the 
reception  of  evil;  (d)  in  communicating  benefits,  or  goods,  serv- 
ice and  helpfulness,  which  are  limited  and  fulfilled  by  the  end, 
viz.  the  bringing  of  the  truly  good,  the  chief  good,  to  one's 
neighbor. 

3.  Further  modifications  of  neighbor-love  in  the  special  re- 
lations of  human  society  find  place  properly  only  in  social  eth- 
ics, to  which  we  now  turn. 


C.    THE  CHRISTIAN  FORMATION  OF  THE  LIFE  OF  HU- 
MAN FELLOWSHIP,  OR  SOCIAL  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS 

a.    CHRISTIANITY   AND    CULTURE   IN    GENERAL.     (By    "  CUL- 
TURE "  IS  MEANT  OBJECTIVE  CULTURE,  OR 
CIVILIZATION.) 

§137.  The  Concept  and  the  Diverse  Ramifications  of  Civiliza- 
tion, or  Culture. 

1.  A  human  life  of  fellowship  is  necessarily  formed  already 
in  the  common  work  of  the  race  at  civilization.     By  civiliza- 
tion, or  culture,  we  understand  all  those  activities  of  man  by 
means  of  which  (a)  a,  technique  and  ideal  control  on  the  part 
of  the  human  spirit  over  nature  are  actualized,     (b)  The  nat- 
ural fellowship  of  man  is  exalted  to  a  spiritualized  fellowship 
at  the  same  time. 

2.  The  main  branches  of  civilization  have  to  do  with  1  (a) 
above,  with  the  exception  of  those  activities  which  are  directly 
related  to  the  body  of  man  as  the  organ  of  his  labor,     (a)   The 
kinds  of  work  which  are  directed  to  the  employment  of  nature 
for  the  practical  ends  of  man  are  (a)  original  production,  (/8) 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     269 

industry,  (y)  business  (trade,  commerce,  exchange),  (b)  The 
activities  which  directly  effect  only  an  ideal  dominion  of  the 
human  spirit  over  nature,  but  also  indirectly  serve  the  technical 
control  of  nature  are  (a)  science  (technical  and  pure  science) 
and  (ft)  art. 

3.  Where  these  activities  (science  and  art)  are  carried  on, 
a  spiritualization  of  the  human  natural  fellowship  is  consum- 
mated.    This  has  reference  to  1  (b)  above,      (a)   In  common 
work  large  unions  on  the  basis  of  interest  are  formed,  which 
are  brought  together  through  calculations  of  utility.     These, 
however,   are  only  themselves   a   higher   natural  communion, 
(b)  A  spiritual  order  guided  by  ideas  begins  with  the  estab- 
lishment of  legislation,  a  code  of  rights,  and  the  formation  of  a 
state,     (c)   At  the  same  time  the  free  intercourse  of  man  is 
regulated  through  custom,     (d)  But  the  moral  order  is  above 
all  this.     This  moral  order  itself  yields  certain  guiding  ideas 
for  the  fellowship  of  legal  right  and  of  customs  mentioned 
above. 

4.  In  the  widest  sense  of  the  word,  civilization  also  embraces 
the  religious  life  of  humanity.     But  considered  from  another 
point  of  view,  secular  culture  and  religion  striving  after  the 
supramundane,  or  really  uplifting  itself  to  the  supramundane, 
stand  opposed  to  each  other,  secular  culture  having  to  do  with 
relative  goods,  religion  with  the  absolute  good,  or  with  blessed- 
ness.    By  way  of  division,  then,  we  have  two  sections,  the  com- 
munions or  orders  of  secular  culture  on  the  one  hand,  the  reli- 
gious communions  of  the  church  on  the  other. 

5.  The  question  of  Christian  social  ethics  is  the  following, 
viz.,  From  the  standpoint  of  Christian  faith  how  are  the  orders 
of  culture  formed  prior  to  and  apart  from  Christianity  to  be 
evaluated,  and  what  are  the  requirements  to  be  demanded  of 
them  ? 

§138.  The  Fundamental  Relation  of  Christianity  to  Civiliza- 
tion, or  Culture. 

1.  The  history  of  the  relation  of  Christianity  to  culture 
shows  many  changes  and  transformations,  (a)  An  express 
positive  valuation  of  the  work  and  goods  of  culture  is  to  be 
found  only  in  a  limited  degree  in  the  words  of  Jesus,  (v.  The 


270      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

Finality  of  the  Christian  Religion,  chapter  IX).  It  did  not 
fall  to  Jesus'  Messianic  calling  to  mould  and  to  bring  into 
prominence  the  worth  of  the  relative  moral  goods  of  civiliza- 
tion. He  was  concerned  in  principle  only  with  the  absolute 
worth  of  the  supramundane  kingdom  of  God.  On  the  whole 
the  attitude  of  the  primitive  Christian  community  was  the 
same  as  that  of  Jesus.  (Query:  Was  the  reason  solely  the 
Trapovo-i'a-expectation,  or  does  that  reason  inhere  in  their  judg- 
ment of  values  itself?  In  other  words,  was  their  attitude  due 
solely  to  an  historical  situation,  or  was  it  involved  in  the  prin- 
ciple of  the  new  religion  itself?)  (b)  The  ancient  and  me- 
diaeval church  united  more  and  more  with  the  traditional 
Graeco-Roman  culture,  or  civilization,  yet  that  church  looked 
with  distrust  and  suspicion  upon  cultural  work,  so  far  as  that 
work  (a)  did  n6t  serve  the  supply  of  the  necessities  of  life,  or 
(/3)  was  not  put  into  direct  religio-ecclesiastical  service.1  (c) 
The  Reformation  carried  over  in  part  this  sentiment  of  the  an- 
cient and  mediaeval  church,  but  it  prepared  the  soil  for  a 
Christian  appreciation  of  secular  culture,  and  it  did  this  by 
virtue  of  its  knowledge  of  the  spiritual  values  and  worthiness 
to  be  gained  in  secular  callings ;  and  by  virtue  of  its  knowledge 
also  of  the  self-dependent  divine  calling  of  parenthood  and 
secular  authority  —  in  other  words,  by  its  apprehension  of  the 
divineness  of  the  family  and  the  state.  Still,  if  the  organic 
danger  which  threatens  Catholicism  is  ever  an  abstraction  from 
naturalism,  that  which  similarly  threatens  Protestantism  is  a 
false  naturalism. 

Note  to  §138:1 

1.  Is  Catholicism  committed  in  principle  to  that  type  of  civilization 
with  which  it  was  originally  as  an  institution  amalgamated? 

2.  With  all  freedom  over  against  the  New  Testament,  the 
systematic  evaluation  of  secular  culture  dares  not  deny  the 
basic  view  given  in  Jesus,     (a)  As  against  the  scientific,  aes- 
thetic and   practical   glorification  of  culture,   it  must  adhere 
strictly  to  the  Christian  judgment  that  not  secular  culture,  but 
only  the  supramundane  kingdom  of  God  is  absolutely  good. 
(b)   Of  course  a  relative  worth  can  and  must  be  attributed  to 
secular  culture  as  auxiliary  means  to  the  earthly  paving  of  the 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     m 

way  for  the  kingdom  of  God.  (a)  Humanity  is  first  united 
through  culture-work  to  a  real  communion,  or  order,  on  the 
basis  of  which  the  fundamental  universalism  of  Christianity 
and  its  world-mission  can  be  effective.  (/?)  Moreover,  the  in- 
dividual finds  only  in  the  culture-communion  of  man  his  use- 
ful vocation  (toward  his  fellows),  therefore  the  material  of 
religio-ethical  activity  and  also  an  education  preparatory  to 
Christian  (subjective)  culture,  i.  e.  to  the  formation  of  the 
Christian  character. 

3.  The  culture-world  of  every  historical  period  has  its  own 
special  signature.     It  thus  offers  to  Christianity  special  diffi- 
culties and  means  of  advancement  as  well,  special  tasks  also 
along  with  both  of  these. 

4.  We  are  now  to  consider  the  various  social  circles  or  orders 
of  secular  culture,  viz.  family,  folk,  industrial  life,  science,  art, 
social  intercourse,  church. 

b.  THE  INDIVIDUAL  ORDERS,  OK  COMMUNIONS,  OF  SECULAB 
CULTURE. 

a.  The  Family. 
§139.  Christian  Marriage. 

1.  The  family  and  the  order  of  marriage  underlying  it  is 
not  a  product  of  Christianity,  but  rests  on  the  natural  relation 
of  man  and  woman,  which  yet  takes  the  form  of  marriage  when 
it  is  firmly  ordered  through  custom  or  right  or  law.     This  order 
of  marriage  and  therewith  the  family  life  have  been  subject  to 
a  development  in  history  everywhere,  even  outside  of  Chris- 
tianity.    It  has  been  brought  into  intimate  union  with  religious 
and  ethical  views. 

2.  But  the  supreme  moral  and  religious  value  of  marriage 
was  first  possible  on  the  soil  of  Christianity,     (a)  Jesus  Christ 
recognized  it  as  an  original  and  inviolable  order  of  God.     (b) 
Paul  rejected  all  legal  requirements  of  celibacy,  commended 
marriage  as  means  of  correction  against  fornication  and  burn- 
ing lust,  and  exalted  it  to  a  symbol  or  picture  of  the  relation 
between  Christ  and  his  church;  yet  he  set  forth  celibacy,  on 
account  of  the  Tra/wnma-expectation,  as  an  easier  state  of  life, 
more  favorable  also  to  service  of  Christ,  and  it  does  not  appear 


272      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

that  the  New  Testament  in  general  deviates  from  Paul  in  this 
point,  (c)  The  ancient  and  mediaeval  church  advanced  to 
the  principiant  higher  evaluation  of  virginity,  yet  it  carried 
through  and  established  a  more  serious  conception  of  the  mar- 
riage relation  over  against  heathen  views,  (d)  It  was  the 
Reformation  that  first  deduced  from  the  evangelical  basic 
thought  the  knowledge  that  as  a  rule  marriage  possesses  high 
ethical  worth  as  against  celibacy,  and  to  be  sure  (a)  as  means 
of  chastity,  (ft)  as  training-school  and  as  actualization  of  a 
personal  fellowship  in  faith  and  love,  (y)"  as  means  of  preser- 
vation of  humanity  and  of  Christianity. 

3.  The  systematic  judgment  concerning  the  ethical  import 
of  marriage  is  given  with  these  three  points  of  view  just  men- 
tioned. Of  course  this  judgment  has  (a)  its  right  only  in 
dependence  on  two  other  positive  reasons.  These  themselves 
are  so  related  to  each  other,  however,  that  (/3)  the  social  import 
of  marriage  can  be  correctly  apprehended  only  from  a  point  of 
view  on  the  basis  of  which  (y)  the  self-dependent  worth  of 
marriage  is  acknowledged. 

4..  From  the  Christian  valuation  of  marriage  the  norms  for 
the  Christian  formation  of  the  married  life  follow,  (a)  The 
kingdom  of  God  should  be  actualized  in  the  state  of  marriage 
by  the  ethicization  of  the  conjugal  union  to  a  special  inner  form 
of  fellowship  in  the  Lord,  and  of  the  fellowship  of  mutual  love 
and  fidelity,  (b)  This  religio-ethical  formation  of  the  con- 
jugal union,  however,  does  not  abrogate  the  natural,  the  legal, 
the  economic  relation  of  married  people,  but  rather  purifies  and 
ennobles  it.  (a)  The  natural  impulse  is  to  be  ennobled  to 
morally  regulated  reciprocal  love  of  man  and  woman.  (j8) 
The  legally  determined  reciprocal  duties  find  their  higher  sanc- 
tion in  monogamous  marriage.  The  position  of  man  as  head 
of  the  house  is  not  only  acquiesced  in  as  a  social  legal  order, 
but  justified  as  a  divinely  willed  order,  but  therewith  at  the 
same  time  regulated  by  Christian  ideals,  (y)  But  also  the 
economic  community  of  the  household  is  acknowledged  in  its 
moral  worth.  Just  on  that  account  it  founds  moral  duties  for 
man  and  also  for  woman,  and  it  is  a  social  abuse  when  they 
are  withdrawn  from  the  fulfilment  of  these  duties  through  uni- 
versal economic  conditions. 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     273 

5.  The  principles  that  should  determine  the  entrance  upon 
marriage  depend  on  3  and  4  above,     (a)   In  general,  to  enter 
upon  marriage  is  duty  where  nature,  the  providences  of  life, 
special  obligations  and  social  relations  do  not  make  a  morally 
normal  marriage  impossible  or  render  it  grievous.     As  to  the 
choice  of  a  companion,  individual  inclination  has  its  right  from 
the  Christian  standpoint,  yet  only  so  far  as  the  conditions  of 
an  ethical  formation  of  marriage  are  given.     The  authority  of 
experienced  counsel  belongs  to  the  parental  will ;  and  where 
moral  reasons  compel  thereto,  the  right  of  veto  from  the  ethical 
standpoint  likewise  belongs  to  the  parental  will,      (b)   Query: 
On  the  basis  of  Christian  Protestantism,  is  it  ethically  required 
that  marriage  should  be  ecclesiastically  consummated,  or  is  it 
only  a  civil  officer  that  must  officiate  from  ethical  necessity  in 
marriage  ?     Again,   what   constitutes   the   ethical   necessity   of 
the  state's  participation  in  the  entrance  upon  marriage  ? 

6.  Divorce.     The  position  of  traditional  Protestantism  is  in 
general  the  following:  in  adhesion  to  the  words  of  Jesus,  the 
Christian  moral  judgment  is  held  to  be  that  divorce  under  all 
circumstances  is  due  to  sin,  and  is  a  breach  of  the  supreme 
divinely-willed  goal  of  marriage.1 

Note  to  §139 :  6 

1.  Is  this  position  correct?  Ethically,  what  is  the  structural  or 
basic  justification  of  divorce?  Is  it  necessarily  sin,  or  is  it  rather 
mismatedness  in  marriage  ? 

§140.  Conclusions  from  the  Christian  Valuation  of  Marriage 
as  to  the  Relation  of  the  Sexes. 

1.  On  the  basis  of  the  Christian  apprehension  of  marriage, 
there  follows  an  irrevocable  judgment  of  condemnation  upon 
sexual  intercourse  outside  of  wedlock.     It  is  degradation  of 
moral  personality  and  is  not  less  so  in  the  case  of  man  than  in 
that  of  woman.     Besides,  the  social  effects  of  this  vice  cor- 
roborate the  Christian  judgment  and  require  warfare  against 
the  vice  —  a  warfare,  however,  whose  correct  means  are  not 
a  matter  merely  of  ethical,  but  also  of  technical  considerations. 

2.  The   so-called    "  woman's   rights "    question   touches   the 
whole  status  of  woman  as  regards  man.     (a)   It  is  itself  a  com- 
plex of  diverse  problems,  viz.,  the  education  of  woman,  the  in- 


274     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

dustrial  activities  of  woman,  the  legal  status  of  woman  married 
and  unmarried,  the  political  rights  of  woman,  the  bindingness 
of  our  present  conventions  and  customs  upon  woman,  (b) 
From  the  Christian  view  of  marriage  as  a  divine  order  of  na- 
ture to  the  end  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  certain  general  points  of 
view  may  be  derived.  But  their  application  requires  not  merely 
ethical  but  also  medicinal,  economic,  political  considerations, 
both  general  and  particular,  concerning  the  relations  of  women, 
(c)  One  thing  is  cited.  In  Christianity  the  full  religious  and 
moral  equality  of  woman  with  man  is  immovably  fixed.  So 
also  difference  of  sexual  character,  which  is  not  so  superficial 
a  difference  as  to  be  adequately  set  forth  as  physiological  merely, 
must  be  taken  into  account  in  the  questions  concerning  woman's 
education,  vocation,  and  legal,  political  and  industrial  status. 

§141.  The  Christian  Household. 

1.  The  relation  of  parents  to  children.     Underlying  the  eth- 
ical relation  there  is  a  natural  relation  again.     There  is  a  nat- 
ural subordination  of  children,  and  a  natural  love  on  the  part 
of  parents.     But  this  is  to  be  exalted  to  religiously  and  morally 
sanctified  authority  and  pedagogic  love.     Training  children  be- 
comes a  school  for  the  training  of  parents. 

2.  As  to  the  relation  of  children  to  parents,  Jesus  Christ 
emphasized  the  relation  to  filial  duty  as  divinely  commanded, 
and  did  so  as  against  self -chosen  performances  (Mark  7:10- 
13).     The  apostolic  proclamation  expresses  the  Christian  prin- 
ciples concerning  the  formation  of  this  relation  of  children  to 
parents.     The  Keformation,  in  polemics  against  ascetic  perver- 
sions, occupied  the  general  New  Testament  position.     Through 
the  Christian  ideal  the  natural  dependence  of  the  child  is  en- 
nobled to  confiding,  thankful  love  and  to  respectful  obedience. 
However,  anti-ethical  requirements  on  the  part  of  parents,  other- 
wise only  entrance  upon  a  self-dependent  vocation,  form  the 
limits  to  filial  obedience  —  but  not  a  limit  to  the  duty  of  piety 
to  one's  parents. 

3.  The  collective  life  of  children  in  the  parental  home  should 
become  a  school  of  Christian  neighbor-love  in  miniature,  and 
therewith  preparation  for  social  duties  of  later  life  at  the  same 
time.1     However  this  collective  life  should  be  the  basis  also  of 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTUEE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     275 

a   specially  intimate  lifelong  friendship  among  brothers  and 
sisters  themselves. 

Note  to  §141  :  3 

1.  The  home  is  the  microcosm  of  which  a  society  of  neighbor-love 
is  the  macrocosm. 


4.  In  the  ^ew  Testament  the  relation  of  master  and  servant 
finds  Christian  regulation,  although  the  form  of  slavery  pre- 
vails there  still.     With  its  eschatological  mood  and  its  well- 
founded  fear  of  social  revolution,  primitive  Christianity  did 
not  seek  to  set  aside  slavery  ;  yet  it  did  validate  a  religio-ethical 
equality  of  the  slave  and  the  free,  and  sought  inwardly  to  trans- 
form the  reciprocal  relation  of  master  and  slave.     Under  the 
changed  relation  of  modern  times,  a  change  still  going  on,  the 
Christian  requirement  as  to  service  still  remains  and  involves 
two  fundamental  points,     (a)   There  should  be  faithful  work 
and  inner  sympathy  for  the  home  that  is  served.     This  insures 
the  Christian  dignity  of  the  service  and  of  the  servant,     (b) 
For  those  who  have  control  of  service  there  is  the  duty  to  treat 
the  servants  not  only  legally  and  humanely,  but  also  as  much 
as  possible  to  let  the   servants  partake  of  the   spirit  of  the 
home,  and  especially  of  its  religious  and  ethical  life. 

5.  Hospitality  no  longer  serves  as  in  primitive  Christianity 
an  essential  practical  need.     All  the  purer,  therefore,  can  its 
ideal  worth,  viz.  giving  and  taking  of  spiritual  possessions, 
come  to  validity  for  those  who  enjoy  them  and  practice  them. 

6.  The  character  of  the  Christian  home,  as  of  the  individual 
Christian,  is  on  the  one  hand  everywhere  the  same  ;  on  the  other, 
however,  it  is  capable  of  and  needs  an  individualizing,  ever 
according  to  the  special  relations  and  endowments  of  the  house- 
hold. 

0.  The  Economic  Life, 

§142.  The  Idea  and  Problem  of  Economic  Life. 

1.  It  is  on  the  soil  of  the  legal,  civil  order  that  the  economic 
life  moves,  i.  e.  the  collective  work  of  human  society  directed 
to  the  satisfaction  of  human  needs  and  to  the  acquirement  of 
property  (goods).  This  economic  life  is  in  part  national,  the 
state  being  an  industrial  unity;  in  part  international,  being  a 


276      CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

connecting  link  between  peoples.  By  economic  order  we  under- 
stand the  regulation  of  labor  and  capital,  or  work  and  gain, 
each  by  itself  and  also  in  their  reciprocal  relations.  In  part 
this  regulation  is  legally  fixed,  in  part  ordered  through  custom, 
and  in  part  founded  on  force. 

2.  The  economic  order  is  in  constant  historical  movement 
and  has  already  passed  through  a  series  of  stages.     This  move- 
ment ever  passes  through  conflicts  and  crises.     In  this  way 
comprehensive  ideals  of  economic  life  reaching  far  beyond  mo- 
mentary needs  are  formed.     Especially  has  the  ideal  of  a  com- 
munistic   and    state-socialism    economic    order   been    set    over 
against  that  of  the  individualistic  order. 

3.  The  social  question  of  our  time  is  an  exceedingly  ramified 
problem.     The  question  is  this,  How  can  the  evil  conditions 
attending  different   vocations,  conditions  which   the   economic 
process  of  development  itself  has  brought  with  it,  be  ameliorated 
and  avoided,  and  especially  how  can  the  contradiction  between 
the  economic  dependence  and  even  servility,  and  the  status  of 
freedom  and  equality  which  is  to  be  actualized  in  political  life 
be  resolved  ? 

4.  Christian  ethics  must  seek  clearness  as  to  whether  Chris- 
tianity relates  itself  indifferently  to  questions  of  economic  life, 
or  whether  Christianity  itself  sets  up  certain  ideals  and  norms 
for  that  life,  and  for  the  treatment  of  this  problem. 

§143.  The  Attitude  of  Christianity  to  Capital  and  Labor,  or 

the  Life  of  Work  and  of  Gain. 

1.  Different  epochs  in  the  historical  attitude  of  Christianity 
to  the  economic  life,  (a)  Jesus  Christ  set  the  saving  of  the 
soul  and  the  possession  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  as  absolutely 
worthful,  over  against  all  earthly  gain  and  possessions.1  Yet 
Jesus  required  abandonment  of  all  possession  only  under  defi- 
nite circumstances,  and  recognized  the  order  of  labor  and  re- 
ward as  a  justified  earthly  order.  According  to  this  Paul  did 
not  assail  the  order  of  property,  and  himself  worked  and  re- 
quired others  to  work  for  support ;  but  Paul  did  emphasize  more 
strongly  still  the  independence  of  the  Christian  of  all  external 
possessions,  and  introduced  the  beneficent  employment  of  pos- 
sessions, (b)  The  ancient  church  gradually  sanctioned  the 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     277 

ascetic  view  of  property  as  the  really  Christian  view.  In  the 
mediaeval  church  ideas  of  national  right  were  interwoven  there- 
with. It  was  in  this  soil  that  enthusiastic  efforts  of  an  apostolic 
communism  could  grow  again,  (c)  As  against  this,  Luther 
justified  property  as  an  order  of  the  creation  of  God.  Influ- 
enced, however,  partly  by  the  mediaeval  views,  partly  by  evan- 
gelical ethical  views,  Luther  turned  against  single  factors  of 
the  existing  order  of  property,  especially  against  interest  and 
rent ;  but  he  left  the  redress  of  mal-conditions  to  the  legal  au- 
thorities, (d)  In  recent  times  the  long-repressed  social 
thoughts  of  Christianity  have  been  emphasized  again  —  in  part 
one-sidedly. 

Note  to  §143 : 1 

1.  Is  it  the  Christian  task  to  make  the  poor  self-respecting  and 
cheerful,  or  to  change  their  lot?     Granting  the  obligation  to  ameli- 
orate the  lot  of  the  distressed,  is  not  modern  Christianity  losing  the 
proper  appreciation  of  the  internal? 

2.  Christianity  imposes  ethical  requirements  on  individual 
men  who  are  bearers  of  the  economic  life,   requirements  in 
which  the  principles  of  the  New  Testament  come  to  expression, 
(a)   It  is  required  of  capitalists  that  they  consider  their  prop- 
erty only  as  a  good  entrusted  to  them  as  stewards  of  God,  which 
obligates  them  to  (a)  humanity  and  equity  toward  those  eco- 
nomically dependent  upon  them,  and  ($)  to  beneficence  toward 
the  needy,      (b)   It  is  required  of  the  poor  that  they  do  not 
allow  themselves  to  be  consumed  by  avarice,  but  in  their  low 
estate  to  maintain  their  Christian  dignity,  and  even  in  their 
poverty  to  seek  to  make  others  rich. 

3.  But  also  the  economic  order  as  a  whole  must  be  subjected 
to  ethical  evaluation  from  the  Christian  point  of  view.     For 
although  ripe  Christian  character  can  live  in  all  economic  re- 
lations or  conditions,  even  the  most  unfavorable,  e.  g.  slavery, 
yet  grievous  and  helpful  conditions  are  given  in  the  economic 
order,  for  the  formation  of  Christian  character. 

§144.  The  Ethical  Requirements  that  Christianity  Makes  of 
the  Economic  Order. 

1.  From  this  evaluation  there  flow  ethical  requirements  for 
the  formation  of  the  economic  life.     Those  requirements  are 


278     CHRISTIANITY  IN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

not  to  be  borrowed  in  a  legal  manner  from  the  Scriptures. 
They  are  to  be  developed  in  a  free  manner  from  the  norms 
of  the  gospel  and  from  the  given  conditions  of  human  society. 
Two  universal  ethical  requirements  may  be  mentioned. 

2.  The  ethical  principles  of  the  kingdom  of  God  come  to 
their  rights  in  the  economic  order  as  a  whole,  only  when  that 
order  promotes  righteousness  and  the  public  welfare,  and  not 
an  inconsiderate,  regardless  egoism.     As  requirements  to  this 
end  mention  may  be  made  of  the  following :      (a)   By  no  means 
the  abrogation  of  private  property,  but  legal  protection;  yet 
also  the  legal  norming  of  the  acquirement  and  transmission  of 
property,     (b)  By  no  means  equal  distribution  of  the  prod- 
ucts of  labor,  but  yet  an  approximate  proportionality  between 
the  public  value  of  labor  and  the  reward  of  labor  to  the  indi- 
vidual,     (c)  By  no  means  a  removal  of  all  competition,  of 
private  interests,  but  yet  a  limitation  of  inconsiderate  conflict, 
and  as  much  as  possible  the  drawing  of  all  members  of  society 
into  a  solidarity  of  their  interests  with  those  of  the  whole. 

3.  The  ethico-religious  training  of  the  individual  member  of 
society  is  alleviated  where  the  economic  order  guarantees  to 
him  as  much  as  possible  the  fundamental  conditions  of  an  or- 
dered external  life,  viz.  (a)  opportunity  to  work  for  him  who 
wants  to  work;   (b)   a  living  support  for  his  person  and  his 
family  for  him  who  works,  and  also  care  according  to  his  in- 
capacity to  work;  (c)  along  with  work  the  possibility  also  to 
lead  a  family  life  and  to  satisfy  the  essential  spiritual  needs 
of  man. 

4.  The  developed  social  ethical  demands  can  never  be  ap- 
proximately attained  merely  through  private  good   intention, 
but  only  through  social  politics,  which  look  toward  legal  regu- 
lation on  the  part  of  the  state.     But  there  are  three  points  in 
which   social  ethics   rather  than   social   politics  must  decide: 
(a)   The  best  ways  and  means  to  the  actualization  of  that  goal 
may  never  be  construed  a  priori  out  of  that  goal  iself,  but  may 
be  discovered  only  through  the  widest  investigation  of  real  re- 
lations, and  through  the  most  difficult  deliberations  of  a  tech- 
nical character ;  and  this  is  so  because  everywhere  there  is  a 
choice  between  the  different  ways,  and  because  undesirable  col- 
lateral   results   are   associated    with    any   means,     (b)   Social 


THE  SUPERSTRUCTURE  OF  CHRISTIAN  ETHICS     279 

movements  may  not  be  set  on  foot  from  caprice.  They  are  at 
least  in  part  processes  of  natural  development,  and  they  are 
historical  processes.  They  require  regard  for  natural  laws  and 
connection  with  the  historical  situation,  (c)  Also  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  the  best  social  order  does  not  create  different 
men,  as  if  by  mechanical  action  upon  them,  but  at  best  only 
alleviates  conditions  for  the  formation  of  moral  character,  but 
ever  certain  temptations  also. 

5.  Although  a  solution,  ever  only  temporary,  of  the  social 
question  is  not  possible  without  the  help  of  the  state  ajid  its 
legislative  order,  yet  all  other  social  circles  are  called  to  co- 
operation, the  church  as  well.  The  church  has  not  only  to  keep 
intact  the  ethical  requirements  of  the  gospel,  but  should  be 
guided  in  all  its  work  by  the  social  spirit.  Above  all,  every 
individual  should  be  socially  active  in  his  circle,  should  be  a 
reconciling  influence,  through  personal  intercourse  with  people 
of  different  callings. 

[The  discussion  of  Social  Christian  Ethics  is  left  incomplete 
(see  §138:  4).  The  following  are  the  section  headings  under 
Folk,  Right  (Law}  and  the  State: 

§145.  The  Concepts  "  Folk,"  "  Right  "  and  "  State  "  in  their 
Reciprocal  Relations. 

§146.  Ethical  Appreciation  of  Folk,  Right  and  State  on  the 
Part  of  Christianity. 

§147.  The  Requirements  that  Christianity  Makes  with  Re~ 
spect  to  Right  and  the  State.] 


GLOSSAKY 

actiones,  actions. 

actiones  creaturarum,  actions  of  creatures. 

ad  fines  Dei,  to  God's  goal. 

auctoritas,  authority. 

casus  conscientiae,  cases  of  conscience. 

causae  secundae,  second  causes. 

causa  prima,  first  cause. 

communicatio  idiomatum,  communication  of  characteristics. 

communio  naturarum,  communion  of  natures. 

concursus,  co-operation. 

conservatio,  conservation. 

contritio,  contrition. 

cooperatio,  co-operation. 

creatio,  creation. 

de  duabus  in  Christo  naturis,  concerning  the  two  natures  in  Christ. 

de  una  Christi  persona,  concerning  the  one  person  of  Christ. 

ecclesia,  church. 

efjtcacia,  efficacy. 

extra  ecclesiam  nulla  salus,  no  salvation  outside  of  the  church. 

gubematio,  government. 

imago,  image. 

imputatio  justitiae,  imputation  of  righteousness. 

in  lege  Dei,  in  the  law  of  God. 

justitia  originalis,  original  righteousness. 

lex  scripta,  written  law. 

liberum  arbitrium,  arbitrary  free  will. 

liberum  arbitrium  indifferentiae,  free  will  of  indifference. 

mens  humana  naturaliter  Christiana,  the  human  mind  is  naturally 
Christian. 

modus,  way. 

modus  vivendi,  temporary  makeshift. 

natura,  nature. 

obedientia  passiva  et  activa,  passive  and  active  obedience. 

opera  bona  necessaria  ad  salutem,  good  works  are  necessary  to  salva- 
tion. 

peccata  actualia,  actual  sins. 

peccatum  originale,  original  sin. 

peccatum  originale  originans,  original  sin  as  cause. 

peccatum  originale  originatum,  original  sin  as  effect. 

281 


282      CHRISTIANITY  LN  ITS  MODERN  EXPRESSION 

perfectio,  perfection. 

perfectio  evangelica,  evangelical  perfection. 

persona  Christi,  person  of  Christ. 

perspicuitas,  perspicuity. 

providentia,  providence. 

providentia  generalis,  general  providence. 

providentia  specialis,  special  providence. 

providentia  specialissima,  very  special  providence. 

providentia  universa,  universal  providence. 

remissio  peccati,  remission  of  sin. 

satisfactio  vicaria,  vicarious  satisfaction. 

secundum  interiorem  hominem,  according  to  the  inner  man. 

secundum  nostrum  concipiendi  modum,  according  to  our  way  of  con- 

ceiving. 

similitudo  Dei,  likeness  of  God. 
status  exaltationis,  state  of  exaltation. 
status  exinanitionis,  state  of  humiliation. 
status  integritatis,  state  of  (original)  innocence. 
sufficientia,  sufficiency. 

terrores  incussae  conscientiae,  terrors  of  a  stricken  conscience. 
testimonium  Spiritus  Sancti  internum,  inner  witness  of  the  Holy 

Spirit. 

unitio  et  unio  personalis,  personal  uniting  and  union. 
unus  triplex,  the  threefold  one. 
vere  peccatum,  really  sin. 
via  causalitatis,  way  of  causality. 
via  eminentiae,  way  of  eminence. 
via  negationis,  way  of  negation. 

vox  et  praeterea  nihil,  empty  sound  and  nothing  more. 
Trapovcria,  advent. 
T,  soul,  life. 


(Greek,  Latin  and  German  expressions  not  included  in  the  above  list 
will  be  found  to  be  translated  in  the  context.) 


INDEX 


Absolute,  30,  47,  107,  111,  152,  203 
Absolute  religion,  31,   33,  46  f. 
Absolute  value,  86  f.,  201,  211,  212 
Absoluteness  of  God,  94,  95,  96 
Absorption  in  God,  225 
Achievement    versus    Donation,    12, 

41,  254,  261;  v.  Task 
Activity  philosophy,  34,  96,  171,  206, 

207,  209  f.,  212,  229,  239;   v. 

Dynamic ;   v.   Spontaneity 
Adam,  119 

Adiaphoristic  controversies,  244 
Advent,  second,  of  Christ,  270,  271 
Adversity,   252 
Aesthetic  activity,  17  f. 
Aesthetic  sentiment,  247 
Aesthetic  value,  v.  Value,  aesthetic 
Agnosticism,  22,  38,  39,  78,  145,  215, 

216,  263 

Alienation  from  God,  259 
Altruism,  25,  26,  27,  33,   182,  202, 

205 

Amelioration,  276,  277 
Amusements,  40,  244,  257,  258  f. 
Anabaptists,  61 
Anarchism,  philosophical,  196 
Ancestor-worship,  v.  Soul-cult 
Angels,  113  f.,  131 
Anglo-Saxons,  249  f. 
Animalism,  229 
Anthropopathism,    135 
Antinomianism,  237,  240 
Anti-trinitarianism,  174 
Anxiety,  freedom  from,  266 
Apocalypticism,  81,  82,  140,  223,  270 
Apologetics,    Chsistian,    1,   2,   34  ff., 

47,  60,  79,  88,  251 
Apostolic  succession,  68 
Apple,  166 
Apriorism,  85 
Arminianism,  133,  174 
Arnold,  Matthew,  245 
Art,  18,  20,  53,  218,  269 
Asceticism,  9,  40,  85,  88,  213,  214, 

224,  257-259,  277 


Assurance,  14,  43,  44,  46,  57,   157, 

170,    177,    208,    231,   259 
Athanasianism,   141 
Atheism,  13,  215 
Atonement,     146,     172  ff.,     174-177, 

179,  253 
Attributes    of    God,    114  ff.,    135  ff., 

152 

Augsburg    Confession,    231 
Aurelius,  Marcus,  87 
Authority,   12,   14,   50,  220  f. 
external,  4,  49,  50,  51,  204,  215, 

218,  225,  240,  273 
of  the  critic,  156 
Autonomy,   191,   243 
Autosoterism,  123 


Bacon,  B.  W.,  253 

Baptism,  88 

Baptists,  61 

Baumgartner,  139 

Baur,  37,  74 

Beautiful,  v.  Value,  esthetic 

Beethoven,  154 

Bender,  W.,  16 

Bible,  v.  Scriptures 

Biblical  theology,  v.  Theology,  bib- 
lical 

Biblicism,  v.  Scriptures 

Biedermann,  23,  57,  100,  172 

Birds,  24,  253 

Birth,  new,  v.  Regeneration 

Blessedness,  12,  13,  14,  18,  24,  69, 
174,  252,  261 

Bonus,  A.,  141 

Bousset,  30,  139,  177 

Bowne,  B.  P.,  172 

Brooks,  Phillips,  262 

Brown,  John,  2,  154 

Brown,  W.  A.,  47 

Bruno,    176,   182,    183 

Buddha,  21 

Buddhism,  21,  22,  29,  87,  213 

Business,  254,  269 


284 


INDEX 


Caiaphas,  145 
Caird,  E.,  37,  100,  138 
Caird,  J.,  37,  94,  138,  172 
Calixtus,  191 
Calvin,  162 
Calvinism,  133 

Canon  of  Scripture,  62  f.,  64  f. 
Capital,  276  f. 
Caprice,  110 

Casuistry,  123,  192,  220,  243 
Catechism,  255 

Catholicism,    61,    67  f.,    69,    86,    88, 
123,   223,  225,  228,  238,  244, 
246,  256,  258,  270,  272 
Causal  explanation,  26,  27,  38,  58, 
107 

and  freedom,  206,  207 
Cause,  153,  210  f . 

and  worth,  5,  76,  77,  85,  210  f. 

final,  v.  Teleology 

first,   108,   109 
Causes,  second,  108,  109 
Celibacy,  224,  271,  272 
Certainty,  v.  Assurance 
Chance,    110 

Character,  67,  198,  210,  216  f.,  232, 
233,  248  f. 

Christian,  249-255 
Charcoal-man,  13,   156 
Charity,   243 
Chastity,  265-272 
Children,  24,   32,  48,   166,  274  f. 
Christ,  Jesus,  7,  8 

as  King,  161,  171 

as  Priest,  161.  168,  169,  171,  178 

as  Prophet,  161,  171 

as  Redeemer,   161 

as  Revealer,  29,  44-66 

communion  with.  154 

death  of,  v.  Death  of  Christ 

deity  of,  90,   144.  154,  253 

divinity  of,  76.   140,   144,  162 

exaltation   of,   52 

exalted,   76,  90,  154,  230  f. 

God  in,  45,  89,  162,  163-167 

historical,    51  f.     (v.    Jesus,    his- 
toricity of) 

ideal,  149 

person  of,  '44,  51  f.,  83 

place  of,  in  Christianity,  29 

pre-existence  of,  90-102,  105,  154, 
176 


Christ,  Jesus  (continued) 

resurrection  of,  52  (v.  Resurrec- 
tion) 

suffering  of,  175,  186  f. 
three  offices  of,    161  f. 
two  natures  of,  v.  Christ,  divinity 
of;    v.    Christ,    deity    of;    v. 
Jesus,  humanity  of 
two  states  of,  143-147 
whole  Biblical,   51,  75,   142 
work  of,  45,  52,  145  f.,  163,  166, 

168 

v.  Jesus  or  Christ;  v.  Messiah 
Christianity,  as  historical  phenome- 
non, 7  IT. 

as  moral  religion,  19,  29  f.,  31 
before  Christ,  7 
essence  of,  v.  Essence 
genesis  of,  62 

Christian  life,  236,  237,  238,  250  ff. 
Christocentric  theology,  31,  75,  76, 
77,    80,    139,    145,    146,    154, 
165 

Christology,  138  ff. 
Church,  246,  247,  269,  273,  279 
and  dogmatics,  3,  4,  71,  74 
and  philosophers,  3,  120 
doctrine  of,  67-71,  166 
Clarke,  W.  N.,   138,  174 
Coal-heaver,  252 
Communicatio  idiomatum,  144 
Communion,  moral,  213,  226  f.,  268 
intellectual,    250 

with  God,  13,  30,  31,  39,  40,  93, 
171,  232,  233,  247,  252,  259, 
262 

Communions,  religious,  14  f.,  24,  41, 
69,  83,  89,  121,  151,  165,  166 
Communism,  276,  277 
Competition,   278 
Conduct,  moral,  247 
Confession  of  faith,  55  f.,  70  f.,  72, 
Confessional,   243 
Conscience,     57,     121,     199  f.,     201, 

203  f.,   209,  229,   243,  254 
Christian,  259 
form  and  content   of,   205 
Conscientiousness,   265 
Consciousness,  149 

Christian,   151,   152,   181 

theology  of,  73,  78,  100 
Consecration,  265f. 


INDEX 


285 


Conservatism,   religious,    167 

Contentment,  266 

Contrition,  237 

Conventionality,  196 

Conversion,  235-238 

Conviction  of  sin,  160;  v.  Guilt-feel- 
ing 

Co-operation,  278 

Cosmos,  v.  Universe 

Courage,  265 

Creation,  4,  25,  103  ff. 

Creativeness,  47,  82,   112,  171 

Creeds,  70;  v.  Confession  of  faith 

Cremer,   156 

Critical  philosophy,  106 

Criticism,  biblical,  61,  66,  74,   104, 
119,  156  f.,  167,  232 

Cross  of  Christ,  18,  91,  233 
of  the  Christian,  251 

Crothers,  263 

Crowd,  3 

Cult,  18,  21,  24,  216,  245,  246,  247, 
256 

Culture,  20,  158,  204,  214,  217,  241, 
265,  268  ff. 

Custom,  196,  218,  269 


Daab,  130,  164 

Dancing,  40,  258  f . 

Death,  39  f.,  41,  45,  182  f.,  251  f., 
266 

Death  of  Christ,  88,  91,  93,  140, 
172  ff. 

Deism,  246 

Deliverance,  v.   Salvation 

Dependence,  religious,  21,  23,  24,  39 

Destiny  of  man,  124 

Deterioration,  216  f.,  254 

Determinism,  110,  113,  205  ff.,  230, 
234 

Development,  v.  Growth;  v.  Evolu- 
tion 

Dignity,  Christian,  260  f. 

Dinah,  Aunt,   13,   156 

Discipline,  257 

Divorce,  273 

Dobschtttz,   191 

Doctrine,  247,  255,  266;  v.  History 
of  Doctrine 

Dogma,  3,  4,  247;  v.  History  of 
Doctrine 


Dogmatics,  Christian,  190 

definition    and    nature    of,     1-5, 

55  ff.,  143 

relation  to  faith-knowledge,  56 
relation  to  other  disciplines,  1-3, 

65  f.,  77 
validity  of,  4 

Dominion  over  the  world,   13 
Donation    versus   task,    or    achieve- 
ment, 9,  12,  41,  159 
Dorner,  J.  A.,  94,  138 
Doubt,    religious,    38,    44,    57,    145, 

167,  173,  177 
Dualism,  106 

eschatological,  164,  262 

ethical,  126 

supernaturalistic,  26,  32,   33,  36, 

37,  40,  49,  S5,  91,  94,  100 
Duty,  215,  239-241,  242-245 

relation   to   virtue,   263  f. 
Dynamic  versus  static  view,  33,  43, 
45,  47,  122  f.,  206,  212,  214  f., 
261 

Ecclesiasticism,  3,  49,  60  f.,  67,  69, 

72,  75;   v.  Church 
Economic    life,    275-279 
Edification,  245,  256,  257 
Education,   moral,   210,   255-257 
divine,  of  man,  30,  31,  32,  40,  54, 

64,  110,  129,  131,  134  f.,  189, 

212,  251,  255,  259  f. 
Embryological  stage  of  religion,  46, 

194 

Emerson,   238 
Emanation,  100,  104 
Encyclopaedists,  201 
End  as  criterion,  245,  254  f.,  257 
Energy,  89,  106 

moral,  207,  215,  216 
Enthusiasm,   87,   265 
Environment,     social,     207,     208  f., 

210,   216  f. 
Epictetus,  87 
Epicureanism,  241 
Episcopal  succession,  68 
Eschatology,  32,  41,  85,  139  f.,  159, 

222  f .,  236,  275 
Essence,  concept  of,  11 

applied  to  angel-faith,  114 

to  Christianity,  5,  8,  13,  29,  31- 

33,  46,  157 


286 


INDEX 


Essence,  concept  of   (continued) 
applied  to  Christology,  142,  176 
to  creed,   71 
to  the  God-idea,  133 
to  the  Kingdom  of  God,  85 
to  man,  89,  121 
to  morality,  194 
to  the  Old  Testament,  185  f. 
to  Paulinism,  88,  141 
to  religion,    10  ff.,    194,   219 
to    the    Satan-concept,    132  f. 
to  Scripture,  65,  71 
Essenes,  225 
Esteem,   267 
Eternal  life,  13,  31,  40,  41,  51,  170, 

261-263 
Eternity,  101,  116,  151,  152,  157 

of  values,  41,  51,  170 
Ethical   culture,   232 
Ethicization,  204,  213,  264,  265,  272 
Ethics,  ancient,  239,  248,  264  f. 
Christian,  1,  43,  170,  190  ff.,  220, 

234 

individual,   235-268,  255 
social,   268-279 
philosophical,  192  f.,  234 
scientific,  51 
Eucken,  94 
Evaluation,  ethical,   155,  158-160 

religious,    155  f.,    160  f. 
Evangelical  theology,  3,  69  f.,  70  f., 

99,  100 
Evil  consequences,    128  f.,    130,   131, 

160,    195  f.,  208 
Evil,   moral,   208 
Evil,  problem  of,  39  f.,  59,  92,   110, 

129  f.,  145,  196 
Evolution,  25  f.,  30,  47,  68,  107,  142, 

171 

in   ethics,   202,  205 
of   the  moral   consciousness,  201, 

202  f.,   211,  212  f.,  254 
Evolutionism,   194 
Existence-judgments,   15  f.,  51,   156 
Existence  of  God,  proofs  of,  18,  34- 

36;  v.  Reality 

Experience,  Christian  religious,  45- 
55 

Fact,  51,   164,   170 
Faith,   1,   145,  232,  266 
and   repentance,    237 


Faith   (continued) 

and  works,  231-234 

in  Christ,  7,  8,  29,  30,  31,  45,  60, 
142,  143,  145,  148,  156 

in  God,  9,  45,  142,   146,   148,   156 

in  revelation,  15,  46,  51,  221,  234 

versus  knowledge,  99,  157 

versus  sight,  92 
Faith's   understanding,   55,  75 
Faith- judgments,  15,  16,  63,  64,  77, 

111,   124,   156 
Faithfulness,  265;  v.  Fidelity 

divine,  137 
Fallacy,   6 

Family,  223,  270,  271-275,  278 
Fanatics,  61 
Fantasy,  18 
Fasting,   224,   258  f. 
Fatalism,  209 
Fate,    110 
Father,  God  as,  30,  31,   82,  83,  94, 

101 

Fear,  260 
Feeling  in  religion,   13,  14,   16,  23, 

151 

Feelings,  Christian,  251  f. 
Fellowship,  v.  Communion 
Feuerbach,   12,  23,  201 
Fidelity,   272 

Filial  relation  to  God,  250 
Finality  of  the  Christian  ideal,  211, 
214 

of  Jesus,  53,  89 
Fire,  161 

Fireman,    87,   252 
Fish,   253 
Fisher,  G.  P.,  172 
Fiske,  J.,  263 
Flag,    16,    24,    247 
Flowers,  32,  167 
Folk-religions,  28 
Forgiveness,    40,    41,    69,    174,    176, 

179,  238,  259 

Foster,  G.   B.,  30,  47,  61,   146,  253 
Frank,  F.  H.  R.,  74 
Freedom,  academic,   167,   182 

of  the  will,  96,  113,  120,  198,  199, 
200,  205  ff.,  208,  209  f.,  211, 
230,  234 

psychical,  205  ff.,  209  f. 

religious,  51,  85 

spiritual,  240 


INDEX 


287 


Friendliness,  268 

Fruit,  161 

Functional   point   of   view,    149  f. 

psychology,    149  f. 

reality,   65,    67,    78,   96,   98,    102, 

141,  154 
Fundamentals,  232 


Gain,  276  f. 
Garden,  166  f.,  170 
Gass,   191 

Genesis  and  value,  202,  203 ;  v.  Evo- 
lutionism 

Genesis,  book   of,  104,  119 
Geocentric  world-view,  107 
German  choir,  246  f. 
Germans,  249  f. 
Gethsemane,  241 
Gift,  v.  Donation 
Gnosis,  69,  73 
Gnosticism,  91 
God,  81  ff. 

as  light,  97 

as  love,  92-94 

attributes  of,  v.  Attributes 

existence  of,  18,  81;  v.  Reality 

in  Christ,   163-167,  180 

living,  91 

personality  of,  20  f.,  164 

revealed   in    Jesus,    145  f. 

suffering,    174,    176 

will  of,  v.  Will  of  God 
God-idea,  10,  17,  22,  26,  44,  58,  89, 
95,  100,   133,  215 

Christian,  10,  14,  30,  35,  87,  101, 

109 

Gods,  14 
Good,  chief,  221-223,  270 

moral  210,  v.  Value,  moral 
Goodness  of  God,  117f. 
Goods,   v.   Values 
Gordon,  G.  A.,  263 
Gospel,  30,  31,  69,  140 
Government,  divine,  91  f.,  134  f. 
Grace  of  God,  69,   133,   136  f.,   156, 

157,  230,  234 
Gratitude,    231 
Greek  church,  250 
Greek  theology,  69,  145  f.,  148 
Growth,  98,   v.   Evolution 

Christian,  238  f.,  255,  259 


Guilt,  39  f.,  127  f.,  133,  169,  173, 
180,  185,  229,  230,  259 

Guilt-feeling,  208,  259;  v.  Convic- 
tion of  sin 

Gunkel,  67 

Habit,  208,  248 

Hallucination,  90 

Happiness,  216 

Harmony  as  ethical  ideal,  214,  265 

Harnack,  69,  75,  172,  191,  250 

Hartmann,   172 

Heart   (in  religion),  15,  16,  35,  38, 

44,    177,   226,  260 
Heaven,  US 
Hedonism,  202,  205 
Hegel,  2,  23,  74 
Hegelianism,  46f.,  57,  84 
Hell,  118 

Heredity,    206,    207,   208,    210 
Herrmann,  13,  75,  156,  191,  243 
Herod,   145 

Heteronomy,  191,  243 
Historical  criticism,  v.   Criticism 
Historical  religion,  Christianity  as, 

33 
Historical  necessity  of  the  death  of 

Jesus,  183ff. 

Historicity  of  Jesus,  v.  Jesus 
History,    relation    to   dogmatics,    3, 

4  f.,  49,  65,  66,  74,  155-158 
to  ethics,  219 
to   religion,    1,   2,    13,    29,   30-44, 

46,   47,   50,    151,   157  f.,    164, 

166  f.,  170 

History  of  doctrine,  57,  68 
Hobbes,  213 
Hoffding,    107,   109 
Holiness,  divine,  93,  94,  135  f.,  183 
Hollmann,  139 
Holtzmann,  7 
Home,  274,  275 
Honor,  260  f.,   267 
Hope,  266 
Hospitality,  275 
Household,  272,  274  f. 
Humanism  and  Christianity,  31,  43, 

49,  83,   140,  146 
Humanitarianism,  170 
Humanity,  dignity  of,  8,  204 
divine,'  149,   153,  168,   171,  173 
endowment  of,   121 


INDEX 


Human  ity   ( continued ) 

worth  of,   48,  49 

Humanity  of  Jesus,  49,  146,  152,  160 
Hume,  201 
Humility,   224,   267 
Hyde,  119,  138 
Hymns,    246  f. 
Hyslop,    246 

Idea,  47,  149,  153 
Ideal,  140 

Christian,  39,  43,  149,  191,  212  ff., 
220,   228 

moral,    212 

Ideal  Christ,  149,  152 
Idealism,   106,    107,   206 
Ideals,  181 

ethical,  212  ff. 

Ideas  in  religion,  5,  6,  12,   15 
Illusion,  2,   12,   18,   50,   158,  207 
Image  of  God,   119,  212 
Imitation  of  Jesus,  53,  54,  121,  140, 

148,  159,  170,  175,  225,  228 
Immanence,  182;  v.  Monism 

of  God,  209  f.,  231,  262 
Immorality,  246 

Immortality,  22,  30,  41,  50,  69,  76, 
168,   181,  246,  262  f. 

relation  to  ethics,  263 
Impassibility  of  God,  93 
Impulse,  124,  125,  126,  209,  257  f . 
Inability,  moral,  229 
Independent  Religious  Society,  247 
Indeterminism,  198,  205,  208,  210 
Indian,  87 

Individualism,  69,  213 
Industry,  265,  269 
Infinite,    151 

Inspiration,   36  f.,   60  f.,  64,  253 
Instinct  in   religion,  24,  25 
Instrumentalism,   149  f. 
Intellectualism,   16,   18,   19,   23,  42, 
49,  99,  121,  156,  166,  232,  247 
Intercession,  169,  170 
Interest,  277 

Inwardness,   69,    170,  226;    v.    Sub- 
jectivity 

Troquois  fire,  59,  cf.  112 
Israel,    187 

history  of,  108 

Jacobi,   191 

James,    Epistle   of,   79 


James,  William,  5,  6,  15,  152,  263 
Japan,  249 
Jealousy,  135  f. 
Jesuitism,  254  f. 
Jesua,  as  ideal  man,   168 
as  model,  228 
as  object  of  faith,  142,   148.  150, 

156 

as  representative  of  God,  86,  139 
as  revealing  the  kingdom  of  God, 

221  ff. 
attitude  of,  to  the  law,  218,  240 

to  secular  culture,  270 
death  of,  v.  Death  of  Christ 
fidelity  of,  166,  167 
finality  of,  v.  Finality 
his  estimate  of  man,  48,  166 
his  thought  of  God,  82 
his  thought  of  himself,  7,  89,  139- 

141,  147,  166 
historicity  of,  46,   139,   142,   147, 

148,  156 
influence  of,  53,  82,  143,  160,  161, 

166,  218 

of  history,  30,  46,  47,  48,  51,  139, 
141,  142,  143,  147,  149,  156, 
166 

religion    of,    166,    174,    177  f. 
representativeness    of,     166,     170, 

179 

service  of,   to  man,    139 
spirit  of,  140,   143,  156,  159,  163, 

166,  204,  218,  228 
spiritual  life  of,  41,  44,  46,  48,  54 
sufferings   of,   52,    130,    145,    172, 

177  f. 

teachings  of,  52,  54,  88,  108,  143, 
148,  166,  224,  225,  226-228, 
271,  276 

temptation  of,  258 
uniqueness  of,   166 
value  of,  158-161 
works  of,  52 
Jesus  or  Christ,  7,  8,  31,  140  f.,  142, 

143,   149,   164,   173 
Jewish   religion,   7 
Jodl,   191 

John  the  Baptist,   140,  225 
Joy,  251  f.,  266 
Judgment,  divine,  82,  117,  130,  134- 

136 
moral,  230 


INDEX 


289 


JUlicher,  139 
Justice,  265 
Justification,  137 

Kaftan,   Julius,   2,   37,   69,    74,   75, 

120,  138,  172 
Kaftan,  Theodor,  39 
Kalthoff,  46 

Kant,  2,  16,  23,  41,  43,  140,  149,  151, 
154,  174  f.,  204,  210,  223,  234, 
239;   cf.  35  f.,   106,   148 
Kenosis,  144 
King,   252 

Kingdom  of  God,  9,  59,  69,  84-87, 
107,  120  f.,  140,  153,  221-223, 
270,  278 

eschatological,   222  f. 
ethical,  222  f. 
Jesus'  thought  of,   10 
Kingdom  of  sin,  229;  v.  Sin,  social 

system  of 

Knowledge,  Christian,  251 
in  religion,  15,  37,  50,  58,  97 

limits  of,  96,  97.  110,  112,  113 
theoretical,  limits  of,  35  f.,  59,  79, 

148,  151,  157 

which  accrues  to  faith,  5,  6,  55- 
79,  71,  72,  105,  111,  115,  120, 
138 

Labor,  276  f. 

Lamb,  24 

Lang,  A.,   25,  27 

Lange,  F.  A.,  12 

Language,  154  f . 

Latin  theology,  69,  145  f.,  169 

Law,   civil,    195,   278,   279 

moral,    194-197,    198,    199,    200, 

201  ff.,  215 

as  divine,  202  f.,  224,  228 
as    unconditional,     203  f.,    212, 

217,  239,  240 
Christian,    226 
and  forgiveness,  238 
of  Christ,  9,  29 
of  God,  13 
Old  Testament,  9 
reign  of,  40,  59,  111-113,  114 
Law-religions,  28-29,  175,  225  f. 
Leadership,  3 
Lecky,  191 


Legalism,  54,  82,  175,  189,  197,  218, 

220,  239  f.,  256 
Lessing,  32,  54,  212 
Liberalism,  149,  233 
License,  240  f. 
Lillie,  191 
Lincoln,  21,   183 
Lippert,  25 
Lipsius,  100,  172 
Logos,  101,  141,  165 
Lord's  supper,  88 
Lotze,  95 

Love,    ethical     (to    neighbor),    90, 
226  f.,  253,  267  f. 

divine    (of  God),  30,  92-94,   146, 
175,  179  f. 

holy,  183 

human,  40,  86 

religious    (to    God),    226,    227  f., 

266  f. 

Luther,  13,  88,  156,  223,  225,  277 
Lutheranism,  133 
Lying,  268 

Mach,   60,    106 

Maclaren,  A.,  246 

Magic,  98,   166,  230 

Manliness,  265 

Marriage,  271-273 

Martensen,   138,   191 

Martha-life,   250 

Martineau,  J.,  191 

Martyrdom,    176  f.,    181  ff.,    186;    v. 

Vicarious  suffering 
Mary-life,  250 
Master  and  servant,  275 
Materialism,  37,  106,  205 
Maurice,    F.   D.,    246 
Mediating  theology,   74-76 
Mediator,  101,  161  ff.,  169,  170,  171, 

187 

Mercy    (divine),  82,   136f. 
Merit,  superfluous,  225 
Messiah,  Jesus  as,   7,   88,    139-141, 

142,  270 
Messianic  concept,  8,  53,  67,  76,  154, 

173,  176,  223 
Messianic  hope,    140  f. 
Metaphysics,  3,  28.  35  f.,  37,  57,  78, 

85,  90,  95,  100,  107,  111,  112, 

113,  121,  147,  164  f.,  203,  219, 

249  f. 


290 


INDEX 


Method  in  Dogmatics,  71-79 

Meyer,  Arnold,  52,  53 

Mill,  J.    S.,   19 

Miracle,  36,  37,  49,  52,  59,  95,  111- 

113,  112,  139,  156,  223,  235 
Missions,  32,  33,  164  f.,  249  f.,  251 
Modern  man,  144,  145,  159,  177,  246 
Mohammedanism,  29 
Monasticism,  225,  238 
Monism,   33,   37,  40,   106,    107,   145 

critical,   17,   107 
Monotheism,    101 

Moral  consciousness,  v.  Conscience 
Moral  law,  v.  Law 
Moral  order,  21,  134  f. 
Morality,    19 

in  relation  to  religion,  19,  20,  25, 
29,  42,  67,  87,  93,  120,  153, 
156,  158,  189,  190,  193,  208, 
215-219,  223,  231-234,  245, 
250 

nature  of,   193  ff.,  196,  253-255 
of  God,   137 

Moralism,   215,   216,   223,  246 
Moravianism,  153 
Mother-love,   161 
Motives,  206,  207,  210,  215,  216,  218, 

231 

Miinsterberg,  39,  51,   194,  263 
Muirhead,  245,  263 
Mutation,  47 
Mystery,  59,    131,   160 
Mysticism,  23,   29,   69,   85,   88,   152, 

153,  227,  228,  250,  267 
Myth,    37,    67,    90,    102,    141,    142, 
176  f.,   183 

Naturalism,  38,   47,    107,    168 

in  ethics,  204,  208,  209,  229,  270 

Nature,   philosophy   of,   60 

Nature-religions,  28 

Nature-worship,  25,  27 

Necessity   of   the   death    of    Christ, 
181  IT.,   189 

Need,    13,   49,  218 

Neo-Platonism,  87,  95 

Nero,   145 

New    Testament,    62,    63,    64,    66  f., 

103  f.,  108,  132,  142,  153,  220 

knowledge  of  God,  82,  83,  101,  118 

Nietzsche,  201,  213,  224,  227 

Norm,  ethical,  221  ff.,  230,  264,  278 


Normative  science,  5 

Oath,    267 

Obedience,  filial,  274 
to   God,    13 

Jesus',  174  f. 

Oberammergau  passion-play,  172 
Objectivity  in  religion,  1,  2,  14,  44, 

50 

Occident,   249  f . 
Occidental    religion,    164 
Old    Testament,    62  f.,   64,    67,    103, 

108,  131  f.,  142,  220,  226,  251 
knowledge    of    God,    81,    82,    87, 

100  f. 

revelation,  53  f. 
Omnipotence,    101,    116,    117 
Omnipresence,  116,  117 
Omniscience,  116,  117 
Ontological   reality,    65,   67,   78,   96, 

98,    102,    141,    154,    162 
Opportunity,  278 
Optimism,    26,    43,    131,    165,    177, 

265 

moral,  217,  265 
Orient,   249  f. 
Oriental   religion,   164 
Origin  of  religion,  24-28 
Original  sin,   122,    123 
Original  state  of  man,    119f. 
Originality   of   Christianity,   48,  82 

of  Jesus,   166,   167,  225 
Orthodoxy,  16,  34,  36  f.,  49,  60,  70, 

71-73,  75,  78,  83  f.,  98  f.,  131, 

141,   142,   144,   147,   183,    189, 

233 

Ortholinear  development,  68,  259 
Osier,   263 
Ostwald,   60,   106 
"Ought,"  194  f.,  197;  v.  Law,  moral 

Pagan,  scientific,  156 

Pain,  39  f.,  45,  91,  92,  129-131,  170, 

174,  177  f. 
Panentheism,  30 
Pantheism,  30,  38,  48,  64,  58,  96, 

106,   117,   118 
Parents,  274 
Parsimony,  law  of,  152 
Patience, '252,  262,  266 

divine,    136 
Patriotism,  16,  24,  56,  227,  247 


INDEX 


291 


Paul,  10,  59,  66,  67,  76,  88,  90,  92, 
119,    126,    141,    142  f.,    176  f., 
223,  230  f.,  240,  246,  248,  262, 
271,   276 
Paulinism,    141 
Paulsen,  94,    172,   191 
Peace,   45,   262 
Pearson,  Karl,  50 
Perfection,  48,  121,  160,  225,  228 

Christian,   238  f. 
Permissible,  244  f.,  254  f. 
Personalities,  42,  54,  68,   134,   157, 

211 

Personality,  85,  89,  96,  159  f .,  161 
development  of,  225,  242,  263,  279 
Christian,    development    of,    235- 

239 

value  of,  260 

of  God,  20  f .,  22,  58,  94-96,  249  f . 
Pessimism,  38,  39,  43,  48,  IOC,  126, 

216,   241,  265 
Pfleiderer,  37,  74,  100,  109,  118,  138, 

191,  215,  258 
Pharisees,  184-186 
Philosophy,  relation  of,  to  life,  3,  58 

to  theology,  66,  79,  85,  169 
Philosophy  of  history,  110 
of  nature,  110 
of  religion,  1-3 
Physiological  psychology,  254 
Pietism,   223,    267 
Placability,  268 
Plato,  213 
Play,  40,   244 
Pleasure,  86,  202,  205 
Pluralism,  37 
Pneumonia,  172  f. 
Political  ideal,  212f. 

spirit,  3 

Politics  and  ethics,  278  f. 
Positivism,  67,   190 
Postulates,  15,  35,  43,  44,  61,  217 
Poverty,  problem  of,  277 

voluntary,  224,  276  f. 
Power,  moral,  229 
Practical  interest  in  religion,  13,  14 
Practical   test,  3,   14,   18,   38  ff.,   43, 

49,  78,  109,  111,  113,  256 
Pragmatism,  3,  34,  65,  67,  78,  105, 

142,  149  f.,  152,  245 
Prayer,  16,  21  f.,  88,  112,  116,  117, 
145,   154,  238,  252  f.,  258 


Preaching,  1,  2,  41  f.,  57,  97,  98,  154, 

224,  236,  246,  266 
Predestination,  133,  209,  216 
Preservation,    103  ff. 
Primitive  Christianity,  139  f.,  141  f., 

143,   147,  270 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary,  247 
Principle,  Christian,  149 
Probabilism,    243 
Prodigal   son,    176 
Progress        through        martyrdom, 

181  f.;   v.   Martyrdom 
Proof   in   religion,    18,   33  ff.,   38  ff., 

42,  142 

scriptural,    65,    101 
Property,  275,  276  f.,  278 
Prophecy,  predictive,  36,  37,  142 
Prophetic  spirit,  56 
Prophets,  Old  Testament,  21,  54,  63, 

81,  82,  134 
Propitiation,  88,   179 
Prosperity,  252 
Protestantism,    61,    68,    69,    86,    99, 

174,  232  f.,  270 
Providence,  91  f.,   108-114,  216,  234 

and  sin,  133 

Psychology,  limits  of,  207 
new,  90 
old,   90,   231 

of  possession,  88,  90,  132 
Psychology  of  religion,  27,  28 
Public  opinion,  196 
Punishment,    128  f.,    130,    161,    174, 

178,   189,  215,  216,  238 
Purinton,  E.  E.,  259 
Purity,   265 
Purpose,  v.  Teleology 

Quietism,  216 

Rain,  253 

Rainbow,   156 

Rationalism,  16,  23,  34,  49,  50,  99, 

115,    118,    120,    147-151,    174, 

232,  246 
Rationality,   74,   78,   111,    117 

sentiment  of,  74 
Reality  affirmed  by  faith,   1,  2,   15, 

16,   18,  48,  56,  58,  66,  77 
Reconciliation,    144,    152,    169,    174, 

180,  188,  23Q 


292 


INDEX 


Recreation,  244,  255  f.,  257 
Redemption,  9,  28,  29  f.,  41,  45,  100, 

136  f.,    152,   181 
religious,   29,    30,   224 
Reformation,     68  f.,     70,     99,     108, 
145  f.,  223,  225,  231,  237,  240, 
270,  272 
Regeneration,  98,  160,  165,  233,  235, 

238,  240 
Reischle,  16,  75 
Relativism,  211 
Relativity  of  the  historical,  46  f., 

140 

Religio-historical  school,  30,  75  f. 
Religion,  10  ff.,  149  f.,  151,  158,  170 
criteria  and  definition  of,  11,  19, 

20,  23  f.,  58,  217 
not   taught,    166 
origin,  of,  v.  Genesis;  v.  Origin 
Religion  and  art,  v.   Art 
and  morality,  v.  Morality 
and  science,  v.  Science 
Religions,  varieties  of,  12 
Religious  life,  250-253 
Renan,    132 
Rent,    277 
Repentance,  176,  223,  235,  237  f. 

and  faith,  237 
Republican  party,  2  f. 
Resurrection,  doctrine  of,  44,  8S 
of  the  body,  32,  41  f.,   157  f.,  262 
of  Jesus,  52,  91,   142,   168,   188 
Resignation,  251,  252,  266 
Retribution,  82 

Revelation,    14,    15,    16,   24,   27,   28, 
30,  36,  37,  38,  43-55,  50,  51, 
76-87,  145  f.,  189,  212,  217  f., 
220  f.,  259  f. 
continuous,  52 
in  art,  53 
in  science,  53 
pagan,  54  f. 

progressive,  in  Old  Testament  his- 
tory, 53  f . 

relation  to  Christian  ethics,  221  ff. 
Reverence,  267 
Revivalism,  236,  238 
Reward,  215,  216,  222 
Righteousness,  9,  39,   137,  265,  267 
Rights,    269 
Rigorism,  250 
Ritschl,  A.,  75,  140 


Ritschlianism,    15,    16,    28,    44,    70, 

77,  85,  157 

Ritualism,  215,  218,  246 
Robertson,  F.  W.,  58,  130,  246 
Romanticism,   153,  213,  214 
Royce,  245,  246,  263 

Sabatier,  A.,  61,   172 

Sabbath,   197,  218,  256  f. 

Sacrament,  87  f. 

Sacramentalism,  69,  87  f .,  233 

Sacrifice,   self-,  218 

Sacrifices.  21,  88,  178 

Sagacity,  265 

Saint-worship,  154 

Saloon,  40 

Salvation,   9,    14,   39,  59,    67,   86  f., 

161,   165,   170,  233,  254 
Sanctification,  31,  45,  180,  236,  239 
Santa  Claus,   141 
Satan,    130-133 

Satisfaction,  172  ff.,  179,  183,  188 
Schelling,  210 
Schleiermacher,  2,  3,  15,  23,  49,  74, 

115,  151-153,   191,  234 
Scholasticism,  34,  83f.,   115 
Schopenhauer,  210,  213,  225 
Schroeder,   25,   27 
Schultz,    18,    75,    109 
Science,    18  f.,  20,  85,  86,   150,   156, 
157,  161,   176,  269 

as  revelation,  53 

Science  in  relation  to  religion  and 
theology,  2,  4,  16,  18,  19,  20, 
22,  34,  38.  50f.,  58,  79,  82, 
104,  106  f.,  122 

Scientific  method  in  dogmatics,  1,  5 
Scriptural    expressions,    57 

proof,   v.   Proof 

Scriptures,  sacred,  and  Christian 
ethics,  220 

and  dogmatics,  3,  36  f.,  49,  65-67, 
72,  73,  74,   75,  78,  83,   131 

and   the   Holy   Spirit,   233 

authority  of,  51,  60-67 

reading  of,  246 

revelation  in,  51,  60-67 
Secularism.  223,  224  f. 
Self-control.   265 
Self-denial,  214,  218,  224,  225,  227, 

257,   258 
Self -effectuation,   150 


INDEX 


293 


Seneca,  87 

Sermon  on  the  Mount,  67 

Servants,  275 

Service  to  God,  44 

to  man,  44,  53,  67,  87,  170,  241, 

242,  243,  255,  267,  268 
Sexes,   relations   of,   273  f . 
Shakespeare,  53 
Shedd,    119,    138,    172 
Sin,  48,  122  ff.,  179  f. 

against  the  Holy  Spirit,  127  f. 

criterion  of,   124 

social    system    of,    126,    127;    v. 

Kingdom  of  Sin 
universality  of,  125,  230 
Sincerity,  265 

Sinlessness  of  Jesus,  159  f.,  167  f. 
Slavery,  275,  277 
Smyth,   Newman,    191 
Social  interpretation  of  religion,  67 
Socialism,  276 
Society,   43 

Socinianism,  147,  159,  174,  183 
Socinus,  148 
Socrates,   183 

Sonship  to  God,  120;  v.  Filial  rela- 
tion 

Soul,  58 

Soul-cult,  25,  27 
Space,  106,  116 

Speculation,   14,  23,  36,  66,  72,  73, 
78,   84,    85,   89,   95,   99,    100, 
109,    116,    149,    174,    217;    v. 
Metaphysics 
Spencer,   H.,   25 
Spinoza,   13,   153,  250 
Spirit,  religion  of  the,  33 
Spirit,  Holy,  50,  55,  64,  83,  99,  100, 
101/142,  154,  230  f.,  233,234, 
249,   252 

sin  against,  127,  185 
witness  of,  37,  60,  61,  72,  88 
Spiritism,  246 
Spiritual  life,   10,   17,  39,  42,  43 

values,  86,  96 
Spontaneity,  26,  47,  82 
Spurgeon,  246 
Starbuck,  15 
State,  223,  269,  270 
Static  view,  v.  Dynamic  view 
Statistics  and   freedom,   206  f. 
Stoicism,  87,   241,  251  f. 


Stones  of  University  buildings,  182 

Strauss,  37,  74,  149,  172,  201 

Strong,  A.  H.,  138,  174 

Strong,  T.  B.,  191 

Struggle  for  existence,  145,  155 

Subjectivity,  44,  50,  73,  110,  160, 
167  f.,  220  f. 

Substance,   22,   96,    107,    153,   249  f. 

Substitution,  174  f.,  176 

Suffering,  v.  Pain 

Suicide,  262 

Sunday,  v.  Sabbath 

Sunday-School,  166 

Supererogation,    works   of,    244 

Superpersonality,    22,    164 

Superstition,  32,   110 

Supramundane,  12,  14,  18,  19,  20, 
21,  24,  40,  44,  45,  50,  51,  52, 
56,  58,  77,  85,  86,  87,  91, 
138,  158,  164,  185,  269,  270 

Swing,  D.,  247 

Symbol,  2,  12,  22,  57,  58,  65,  67,  95, 
96,  100,  114,  132,  141,  142, 
164,  169,  183,  262 


Task  versus  Donation,  9,    159,   24S 

Teichmtiller,  139 

Teleology,  38,  58,  59,  84,  95,  105, 
107,  109f.,  114,  116,  118,  122, 
134,  138,  153,  172,  182,  183  ff., 
187-189,  203,  211 

Temptation,  39  f.,  178,  209,  254,  258 

TenBroeke,  89 

Tennyson,   117 

Tertullian,   31 

Thankfulness,  266,  268 

Theater,   259  f . 

Theism,  arguments  for,  34-36 
the  older,  30 

Theocentric   theology,    165 

Theodicy,   134:   v.   Evil,  problem  of 

Theology,  biblical,   1,  2,  65,  76 
systematic,  1,  57,  83,  177;  v.  Dog- 
matics 

Theoretical  explanation,  132,  141 
interest,    14,  33  ff. 
judgments,  16,  57 

Thymetie  judgments,   16 

Time,   101,   106,  116 

Tolstoi,  224 

Tortoise,  247 


294 


IXDEX 


Transcendence,  100,  262;  v.  Dual- 
ism, supernatural  istic;  v. 
Reality  affirmed  by  faith;  v. 
Supramundane 

Trinity,  90,  98-102,  100,  102,  166, 
174,  236 

Troeltsch,    30,    75,    138 

Trust,  266;   v.  Faith 

Truth,   196,  200,  201  ff.,  211 

of  the  Christian  religion,  5,  33  ff., 

154  f. 
of  religious  judgments,   18,  27  f., 

82 
two-fold,  34 

Truthfulness,    265,    268;    v.    Vera- 


Union,  Christian,  181 
Unions,    269 
Unitarianism,   98,   102 
Universal  religion,   165 

validity,  212  ff. 
Universe,  58 
Uprightness,  267  f. 
Utilitarianism,   202,   204,   205,  213, 
214 


Value,  absolute,  v.  Absolute  value 
aesthetic,  156,  197  f.,  211 
moral,  196,  197,  198,  217 
of  man,  48 
religious,   217 
Value  and  cause,  5,  24,  42,  76,  77, 

85,   210  f., 

and  genesis,  v.  Genesis;  v.  Evolu- 
tion 

versus  fact,  164 
Value-judgments,  15-17,  37,  44,  59, 

76,   156,   160,    164 
Values,    10,   20,   61,    157,    170,    177, 

211,  217;   v.  Evaluation 
eternity  of,  41,  51 
philosophy  of,  213 
Voraciousness,    19,    140,    157,    167, 

177,   182,  225,  268 
Vicarious  suffering,   3,  8,    130,   140, 

I75ff.,  181  ff.,   186 
Virtue  and  virtues,  239,  248,  263  ff. 


Vocation,  59,  121,  158  f.,  167,  177, 
208,  218,  225,  228,  238,  241  f., 
248,  251,  252,  255,  270,  271, 
274 

Vows,  256 

Wages,  278 

Ward,  L.  F.,  11 

Watchfulness,  258,  265 

Watson,  J.,  119,  138 

WTealth,  197 

Weinel,  7,  30,  83,  88,  140 

Weiss,  J.,  30 

Weisse,    95 

\Vernle,  30,  172 

Wheat,  20 

Will,   248,   251 

in  religion,   12,   13,    16,   39 
in    religious   knowledge,    55 
of   God,   190,    191,    193,  215,   220, 
222,  225,   232  f.,   241,  253 

Wimmer,    253 

Windelband,  204,  211 

Wisdom,   265 
of  God,  118 

Wish-beings,   14 

Witness  of  the  Spirit,  v.  Spirit 

Wobbermin,  139 

Woman's   rights,   273  f . 

Word,    101 

of  God,  63,  64,  163,  177;  v.  Reve- 
lation 

Work,   86,   276,   278 

of  Christ;   v.  Christ,  work  of 
of  God,  89  f.,  91,  97,  163 

Works,  215,  224,  225,  258 
good,  231-234 

World,  254,  264,  266 

World-view,  132,  153,  216,  217 
Christian,  109 

Worship,    18,    117,   246,  247,   253 

Worth,  v.  Value 

Wrath  of  God,  136,  173 

Wrede,  75,  88,  139 

Wundt,  5,  94,  191,  263 

Wuttke,  191 

Yearning,  religious,  262 
Zeller,  37 


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